admin | January 8, 2018
This week’s Farmer story from Kenya discusses using soya beans to manage striga. To better understand striga and to learn about other ways of managing this weed, check out the videos, factsheets, and script described below.
Crop rotation and intercropping reduce damage from striga weed
This two-host discussion from Farm Radio Resource Pack 72 discusses how to manage striga. Striga feeds on rice, maize, millet, sorghum, cowpeas, and sugar cane, and can damage up to 70% of crops in a field. The key to managing striga, also known as witchweed, is to use a variety of control methods at one time. Crop rotation, intercropping, planting resistant cereal varieties, soil fertilization, and hand weeding are all important methods that should be used together when managing striga. This script discusses crop rotation and intercropping in particular.
http://scripts.farmradio.fm/radio-resource-packs/package-72-integrated-pest-management-strategies-for-farmers/crop-rotation-and-intercropping-reduce-damage-from-striga-weed/
Integrated approach against striga
The parasitic weed striga causes more damage to cereal crops in poor soils, so weed control and soil fertility have to be tackled together. This video from Access Agriculture discusses why it is important to combine at least three control methods to reduce striga and obtain a good yield of sorghum, millet, maize, or rice.
This video is available in Amharic, Arabic, Bambara, Bariba, Bomu, Buli, Chichewa, Dagaari, Dagbani, Dendi, English, Frafra, French, Gonja, Hausa, Kikuyu, Kiswahili, Kusaal, Luo, Mooré, Nago, Peulh Fulfuldé, Portuguese, Sisaala, Wolof, and Zarma.
You can also download the audio or factsheet.
https://www.accessagriculture.org/integrated-approach-against-striga
Striga management in rice
In this video from Access Agriculture, farmers in Madagascar show how following four key principles can give you a good rice harvest despite the presence of striga.
This video is available in English, French, Kiswahili, Malagasy, and Portuguese.
You can also download the audio or the factsheet.
https://www.accessagriculture.org/striga-management-rice
Learn more about striga biology
One of the major parasitic weeds is striga, a plant that sucks the juice and nutrients from cereal crops such as millet, sorghum, and maize and causes great yield losses. A single striga plant can produce hundreds of thousands of seeds. The seeds are so tiny that most farmers do not know they are seeds; they look more like black dust. But don’t be fooled. Learn more in this video from Access Agriculture. You can also download the audio or the factsheet.
This video is available in Amharic, Arabic, Bambara, Bariba, Bomu, Buli, Chichewa, Dagaari, Dagbani, Dendi, English, Frafra, French, Gonja, Hausa, Kikuyu, Kiswahili, Kusaal, Luo, Mooré, Nago, Peulh Fulfuldé, Portuguese, Sisaala, Wolof, and Zarma.
https://www.accessagriculture.org/striga-biology