Assessing the potential of forage pea (Pisum sativum) cultivars for seed production

Abstract

Producing the pea (Pisum sativum L.) seeds with high quality and able to meet diverse market criteria is not an easy task. Like many other annual legumes such as vetches (Vicia spp.), pea is rather susceptible to lodging. This is extremely specific for its forage agronomic type, where abundant aboveground biomass and high forage yield means poor lodging tolerance and large seed loses. The aim of our research was a comparative analysis of ten forage pea cultivars dominant on the Serbian market, targeting seed yield, number and length of internodes, plant height, first pod height and number of branches. A small-plot trial was carried out at the Experimental Field of the Institute of Field and Vegetable Crops at Rimski Šančevi in 2011 and 2012, including the cultivars with normal and afila leaf types, with white and purple flowers and with determinate and indeterminate stem growth. The seed yield in the cultivars with normal leaf type and white flowers (5012 kg ha-1 and 5182 kg ha-1) was significantly higher in comparison to the cultivars with indeterminate stem growth and purple flowers and insignificantly higher than in the cultivars with white flowers and afila leaf type.