Grain, fodder and residue management

Although this document is intended to report research on Vertisols, livestock do not respect this boundary as they graze communal land. Hence a general situation of the available feed resources in the highlands is also highlighted which is followed by specific efforts of collaborative partners of the Joint Vertisol Project. In this paper the improvement of native pasture; crop residues as main animal feed and possibilities for increased production; fodder improvement in the Ethiopian highland Vertisols, traditional management and cropping patterns and calendar of highland Vertisols are discussed. This paper examines the possibility of early planting of improved wheat varieties on drained Vertisols as Opposed to the traditional late planting, towards the end of the rainy season, and evaluates wheat varieties in terms of grain and straw yields and quality across highland drained Vertisols sites

Determination of tsetse challenge and its relationship with trypanosome prevalence in trypanotolerant livestock at sites of the African Trypanotolerant Livestock Network

Reports the determination of tsetse challenge at sites of the African Trypanotolerant Livestock Network and its relationships with trypanosome prevalence for the period 1984-1986. Lists the Network sites with trypanotolerant cattle or sheep together with the tsetse species detected. Discusses tsetse species captured, tsetse relative density, trypanosome infection rates and infection types in tsetse, and tsetse challenge and trypanosome prevalence in trypanotolerant livestock

Determination of tsetse challenge and its relationship with trypanosome prevalence in livestock within the African Trypanotolerant Livestock Network

Determines the tsetse challenge and its relationship with trypanosome prevalence in livestock at eleven sites within the African Trypanotolerant Livestock Network. Includes tsetse species, their distribution, habitats, and relative density; trypanosome infection rate; and frequency of vivax and congolense - type infection; also shows the overall tsetse challenge determined from the product of relative density; and tsetse challenge and trypanosome prevalence for trypanotolerant and other cattle herds

Determination of potential management zones from soil electrical conductivity, yield and crop data*

One approach to apply precision agriculture to optimize crop production and environmental quality is identifying management zones. In this paper, the variables of soil electrical conductivity (EC) data, cotton yield data and normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data in an about 15 ha field in a coastal saline land were selected as data resources, and their spatial variabilities were firstly analyzed and spatial distribution maps constructed with geostatistics technique. Then fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm was used to define management zones, fuzzy performance index (FPI) and normalized classification entropy (NCE) were used to determine the optimal cluster numbers. Finally one-way variance analysis was performed on 224 georeferenced soil and yield sampling points to assess how well the defined management zones reflected the soil properties and productivity level. The results reveal that the optimal number of management zones for the present study area was 3 and the defined management zones provided a better description of soil properties and yield variation. Statistical analyses indicate significant differences between the chemical properties of soil samples and crop yield in each management zone, and management zone 3 presented the highest nutrient level and potential crop productivity, whereas management zone 1 the lowest. Based on these findings, we conclude that fuzzy c-means clustering approach can be used to delineate management zones by using the given three variables in the coastal saline soils, and the defined management zones form an objective basis for targeting soil samples for nutrient analysis and development of site-specific application strategies