Cowpea

“ The cowpea bacteria are already quite widely distributed in southern Illinois, especially where this crop has been grown for several years, but they are not common in the soils of other parts of the state. It is doubtful, however, if it is necessary or even worth while to take the trouble to inoculate soil for cowpeas. Some few tubercles almost invariably develop on cowpea roots the first year they are seeded, even where they have never been grown before, and if seeded the second year on the same land the plants are usually abundantly provided with root tubercles. ”

“ Self-inoculation is quicker in the cowpea than in alfalfa because the vines carry some soil on them, and thus the dust in the seed crop may be rich in bacteria. However, most new seedings of the cowpea do not show a large number of nodules on the plant roots, and inoculation pays. In some cases it makes the difference between failure and success. Two hundred pounds of soil from an old field should be well harrowed into each acre of land when preparing for a cowpea seeding in a new region. ”

“ The cowpea has distinct advantage over the clover in its ability to supply nitrogen and organic matter within a few months, and in its adaptation to very poor soils where clover would not make much growth. As a catch crop it has great value. ”

“ Varieties.—There are many varieties of the cowpea, and confusion of names prevails, although some stations have done good service in identification of individuals carrying a number of names. The very quick-maturing varieties adapted to northern conditions do not make as much foliage as the rank-growing ones that require a relatively long season, but some of them are heavy producers of seed. ”

“ In selecting varieties it is well to choose those that grow straight up, those that are hardy, those that fruit early and abundantly, and those that hold their leaves. The variety selected for seed should also suit the land and the climate. [Pg 252]
The cowpea will grow in almost any soil. It thrives best and yields most bountifully on well-drained sandy loams. The plant also does well on clay soils. On light, sandy soils a fairly good crop may be made, but on such soils, wilt and root-knot are dangerous foes. A warm, moist, well-pulverized seed-bed should always be provided. ”

“ It grows more upright than the cowpea and produces a large amount of stem and foliage which may be used for fodder or turned under for green manure The seeds are used for food for man and beast. The soy bean is planted and cared for in the same manner as the cowpea.
The Canadian Field Pea is sometimes grown in the north as a green manure crop.
White Sweet Clover, white melitot or Bokhara clover, grows as a weed from New England to the Gulf of Mexico. In the Gulf States it is regarded as a valuable forage and green manure plant. One or two pecks of seed per acre are sown in January or February. ”

“ Lamb, the Director of Agriculture (Imperial Institute Bulletin, vol. xi. [1913] ) , entitled “Agriculture in Haussaland,” it appears that leguminous crops have recently been introduced more generally in the rotation employed among the Haussa cultivators. The author remarks that the cowpea (Vigna catjang) is now almost invariably grown with cereals, and that there is such an increase in groundnut cultivation that this has come into great prominence as an exported crop. ”

“ There is ordinarily not enough time for the cowpeas to mature, but they add to the value of the stand for fall pasturage and protect the clover from severe weather in the winter. Both cowpeas and buckwheat have the merit of being able to grow on poor soil. ”

“ The trailing habit is affected by the soil, the bunch varieties tending to trail when grown on fertile land. When the crop is wanted for seed, the peas that do not trail heavily will prove more satisfactory. The selection of variety is a matter of latitude and purpose, exactly as it is with corn.
Fertilizing Value.—A heavy growth of the cowpea is worth as much to the soil as a good crop of red clover. When the equivalent of two tons of hay is produced, the roots and vines contain nearly as much plant-food as the roots and first crop of medium red clover that makes two tons of hay. ”

“ It may be that the same bacteria also live on some other leguminous plant which is more or less widely distributed over the state, but it seems more likely that the bacteria are brought with the seed. As a matter of fact, the cowpea harvest is usually dirty. This is an annual plant, and consequently the crop is grown on recently plowed land and is sometimes cultivated during the season. Cowpeas are commonly harvested with a mowing machine and then raked up on the loose ground. When they are threshed more or less dirt remains with the seed. ”

“ Heavy soils are made much more mellow by the cowpea, and when the crop is removed for hay, the stubble-land is easily prepared for a seeding to grass or small grain. When the growth is plowed down, the soil may be made too loose for seeding to small grain, but is put into prime condition for a tilled crop. ”

“ It takes mighty good land to grow clover; but cowpeas are better for us. They do pretty well for this old land, only the seed costs too much, and they make a sight of work, and they're mighty hard to get cured. You see they aren't ready for hay till the hot weather is mostly past. ”

“ This crop not only has power like the other legumes to take nitrogen from the air, but it is also a strong feeder, that is, it can feed upon mineral plant food in the soil that other plants are unable to make use of. For this reason it will grow on some of the poorest soils, and is a good plant with which to begin the improvement of very poor land. It is a deep-rooted plant. On the farm of the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute cowpea roots have been traced to the depth of sixty-one inches. ”

“ A grain drill makes the seeding in a satisfactory manner, and the seed may be drilled solid or in rows for cultivation. When the crop is grown as a fertilizer or for hay, solid drilling is good, and about five pecks of seed gives a good stand of plants if peas are sound. Much cowpea seed is low in germination power, and the buyer should exercise caution. ”

“ In cool latitudes the soybean is recognized as distinctly more profitable, making larger yields of vines and of seed. Where adaptation is equal, the cowpea makes a slightly larger growth of vines for hay, but the soybean gives a much richer lot of seed for use as grain.
When soil fertility is the chief consideration, the adaptation of climate and soil should decide our choice between these two legumes. There is no serious difference where conditions for each are equally good. In cool latitudes the soybean should be chosen. In the Ohio Valley it is usually to be preferred. ”

“ Cowpeas will grow on almost any land that is not too wet. From one and one-half to three bushels of seed are used per acre. These are sown broadcast and harrowed in or are planted in drills or furrows and cultivated a few times. ”

“ Fig. 234. Cowpeas
If this crop is grown for hay, the method of seeding and cultivating will differ somewhat from the method used when a seed crop is desired. When cowpeas are planted for hay the seeds should be drilled or broadcasted. If the seeds are small and the land somewhat rich, about four pecks should be sowed on each acre. If the seeds are comparatively large and the soil not so fertile, about six pecks should be sowed to the acre. It is safer to disk in the seeds when they are sowed broadcast than it is to rely on a harrow to cover them. ”

“ Oats may be followed by cowpeas. When the cowpeas are planted in rows on good land, well fertilized and cultivated, the yield is usually from ten to twenty bushels of peas and one and a half tons of hay. The peas usually sell for about $2 per bushel and the hay for about $12 per ton.
Ninety bushels of oats and sixty-seven bushels of peanuts were produced on the same land at the Mississippi Delta Experiment Station in one year. ”

“ The cowpeas make their growth during the summer months when nitrification is most active, whereas the clover growth we have counted on occurs chiefly during the fall and spring when nitrification is much less active, consequently the clover probably takes even a larger proportion of its nitrogen from the air than we have counted on. ”

“ The catch crops add organic matter while cleansing the land of weeds; the fallowing releases plant-food and is peculiarly efficient in killing out weeds.
Care must be exercised about preserving moisture in the ground, and therefore a green crop should not be plowed under immediately before seeding time. When a soil is thin, there may be no better preparatory crop than the cowpea, which will not make too rank a growth in the north to prevent its handling with a weighted disk harrow. ”

“ Cowpeas will be killed by frost in most places and should, therefore, be plowed in this fall whenever you have a large growth of green stuff and the ground gets moist enough so that the trees will not be endangered by drying out of the soil, which is likely to occur after plowing in coarse material, unless the soil is kept moist by rain or otherwise. ”

“ Crimson Clover, also called German clover and Italian clover, is a valuable green manure crop in the central and southern States east of the Mississippi. It is a hardy annual in that section and is generally sown from the last of July to the middle of October, either by itself or with cultivated crops at their last working. Fifteen and twenty pounds of seed are used to the acre. It makes a good growth during the fall and early winter and is in blossom and ready to cut or plow under in April or May. It grows at a season when the cowpea will not live. ”

“ This means that when you are planting your ground for cowpeas the next year after wheat or oats, we are just ready to begin harvesting our clover hay; and besides the regular hay crop we usually have some growth the fall before which is left on the land as a fertilizer, and then we get a second crop of clover which we save either for hay or seed. Even after the seed crop is harvested there is usually some later fall growth, and some let the clover stand till it grows some more the next spring and then plow it under for corn. ”

“ A method that is very effective is [Pg 72] to smother the weeds by a dense growth of some other plant, for example, cowpeas or buckwheat. Cowpeas are to be preferred, since they also enrich the soil by the nitrogen that the root-tubercles gather.
Weeds do injury in numerous ways; they shade the crop, steal its nourishment, and waste its moisture. Perhaps their only service is to make lazy people till their crops. ”

“ For green manure nothing is better than cowpeas as a summer crop and crimson clover as a winter crop. The crimson clover should be turned under about the time it comes into full bloom in the spring, the land planted to cowpeas, and the resulting crop plowed under or mowed for hay during the month of August in ample time to prepare the land for frame work during the autumn. When heavy crops of green manure are turned under it is essential that lime be used to improve the mechanical condition and to sweeten the soil; a dressing of 1,000 pounds to the acre should be sufficient. ”

“ Where the subsoil is hard and impervious, the yields are quite meager under unfavorable climatic conditions and the crop needs considerable nursing such as disking and harrowing, to keep the crab grass from taking the field in a few years. On these upland soils with the hardpan subsoils which grow cowpeas to perfection, the farmer who is not willing to inform himself about proper methods and to give his alfalfa fields much attention and care, should grow cowpeas instead. But as has been indicated before, alfalfa is being grown on such soil successfully and profitably, but only in small areas. ”

“ In regions where clover does not thrive and wheat and oats are not grown, a rotation of corn, cowpeas, and melons may be employed, or the rotation extended by seeding to grass after the melons are harvested. ”

“ We do not really need to know why an occasional soil is supplied with the bacteria of a legume new to it. We have learned that the bacteria of sweet clover serve alfalfa, and this accounts for the inoculation of some regions in the east. We believe that some bacteria are carried in the dust on the seed, and produce partial inoculation. Other causes are more obscure. The cowpea trails on the ground, and carries its bacteria more successfully than the soybean. Most legumes require a soil artificially inoculated when brought into a new region, failing otherwise in some degree to make full growth. ”

“ It is usually better to sow rye for a winter cover and cowpeas for a summer crop if a cover crop is thought to be needed. In any section where crimson clover has not been previously grown the first seeding should be on a small scale to determine whether or not it is a practicable crop for the locality in question. ”

“ Our land simply won't grow it any more. Not having to plow for clover would save a great deal of the work we must do for our cowpeas."
"Some of our farmers follow a three-year rotation and plow the ground only once in three years," said Percy. "They plow the ground for corn, disk it the next spring when oats and clover are seeded, and then leave the land in clover the next year. In that way they regularly harvest four crops, including the two clover crops, from only one plowing ”

“ The growing plants should be cultivated two or three times with a good cultivator. Cowpeas were formerly gathered by hand, but such a method is of course slow and expensive. Pickers are now commonly used. ”