Hairy vetch

Economic importance

Hairy vetch is a facultative winter annual, but is grown as a winter crop. It is the only leguminous crop that is sown simultaneously with winter cereals of group I. It can be grown in spring, summer post-cutting, and stubble sowings.

Due to its high fodder value, it serves as a valuable leguminous plant. It is used fresh, for silage, haylage, hay, etc. Winter sowings of vetch-rye mixture can be used for early spring grazing of livestock.

It is well eaten by animals, especially in mixture with cereal grasses in green or preserved form. When sown in autumn, it provides early fodder in spring with a high protein content. According to data from Voronezh Agrarian University, the use of hairy vetch in mixed sowings with winter cereals increases the yield of fodder mass by 20-50%, and the protein content by 1.5-2.0 times, at a lower cost of fodder.

The protein content in the above-ground dry mass before cutting for hay is 15-25%, fat — 1.4-2.4%, nitrogen-free extractives — 17-29%.

When sown in autumn, it can also serve as an annual early spring pasture, since it begins flowering in May, whereas when sown in spring in mixture with oats, barley, or Sudan grass, it is suitable for grazing in late summer and autumn; in this case flowering occurs in mid-July.

After cutting or grazing, it regrows in 20-25 days. Rye is considered less suitable for mixtures with hairy vetch for fodder purposes than wheat, since by the time vetch flowers, rye becomes coarse. If this mixture is cut earlier, yield decreases.

Hairy vetch is distinguished by early maturity, high productivity, and quality. In fodder value it is not inferior to other leguminous grasses. The disadvantages of the crop include leaf shedding and a somewhat bitter taste due to the presence of the alkaloids vicin and vicinin. However, in mixtures the latter disadvantage is almost not manifested.

100 kg of green mass contains 13.7 feed units and 3.1 kg of digestible protein. 100 kg of hay contains 46.2 feed units and 12.4 kg of digestible protein. 100 kg of hay of vetch-rye mixture — 48.5 feed units and 8.7 kg of digestible protein.

The protein of hairy vetch includes all essential amino acids. The digestibility coefficients are 69% for crude protein, 65% for true protein, 45% for fiber, 60% for fat, and 68% for NFE.

Hairy vetch also has agronomic importance, as it serves as an excellent predecessor in crop rotation for grain, fodder, and row crops. It is well suited as green manure.

Honey plant.

With the development of the winter-hardy variety Glinkovskaya, it became possible to expand sowings of this crop in the forest-steppe and steppe zones as a fallow-occupying and intermediate fodder crop. All sowings of winter grain crops intended for early green fodder and partly for grain should be sown in mixture with this variety.

As a spring crop, hairy vetch is cultivated in mixtures with oats, barley, annual ryegrass, Sudan grass, Japanese millet, sorghum-Sudan hybrid, millet, maize, foxtail millet, Italian millet, sunflower.

History of the crop

Hairy vetch is found in the wild in Western Asia and the Caucasus and is distributed there as a weed plant.

It has been grown in cultivation since the 19th century, but in some countries of Western Europe it has not become widespread.

Cultivation areas

Main cultivation areas: southern regions of the Non-Chernozem Zone, Voronezh, Tambov, Kursk oblasts, also in the North Caucasus, western regions of the forest zone of the European part of the country.

The crop succeeds well in regions with mild winters.

Yield

The yield of green mass is usually 20-30 t/ha, hay 4-5 t/ha.

According to long-term experimental data of Gorsky Agricultural Institute, the yield of green mixture of winter rye and hairy vetch was 29.3 t/ha. According to data of Kuban Agricultural Institute, the yield of green mass of a mixture of hairy vetch and winter wheat was 23.0 t/ha.

With good agricultural technology, the seed yield collected from vetch-rye sowings is 960 kg/ha of vetch seeds and 2000 kg/ha of rye grain.

Botanical description

The genus vetch (Vicia) includes more than 150 species, including 36 annual ones. Only three are used in agricultural production:

• common vetch, or spring vetch — Vicia sativa L.;
• hairy vetch, or winter vetch, or sand vetch — Vicia villosa Roth;
• Hungarian vetch, or Pannonian vetch — Vicia pannonica Crantz.

Winter vetch, or hairy vetch, or sand vetch (Vicia villosa Roth).

The root is well developed, thin, taprooted, with numerous lateral branches.

The stem is thin, strongly pubescent, branched, 70-120 cm tall, and lodges quickly.

The leaves are even-pinnate, ending in a tendril. The number of leaflets is 6-8-10 pairs, lanceolate, pubescent.

The inflorescence is an elongated axillary many-flowered raceme. The number of flowers in the inflorescence reaches 30. The corolla color is violet or reddish. Flowering begins from the lower flowers. Pollination is cross-pollination.

The fruit is a pod of dark brown or yellow-brown color, flattened, elongated-rhombic. The number of seeds in a pod is 2-8. The seeds are spherical, spotted, black or dark brown. The weight of 1000 seeds is 25-31 g.

Biological features

Vegetation

Vegetation usually begins in autumn and ends in summer of the following year. Using the favorable conditions of autumn, it forms a greater biomass than common vetch.

A polymorphic species; by type of development it is represented by a complex population of biotypes, among which there are facultative, spring, and winter forms.

Phenological phases:

• germination;
• emergence;
• branching;
• budding;
• flowering;
• pod formation;
• ripening.

When sown in autumn, the first three phases occur in autumn, the rest — in spring and summer of the following year.

During germination, it does not carry the cotyledons to the soil surface. Germination is completed by the formation of a seedling and root. The first nitrogen-fixing nodules are laid 6-10 days after emergence; after 14 days they can already provide the plants' nitrogen requirement.

Branching begins 7-15 days after emergence. The main stem stops growth and dies.

Lateral shoots are formed from a node located close to the soil surface. Hairy vetch has underground tillering nodes, from which new shoots are formed. By type of shoot formation, three types of development are distinguished:

• spring — in autumn and spring sowings, shoots are formed only from above-ground branching nodes;
• facultative — when sown in autumn, shoot formation occurs from
• underground and above-ground buds; when sown in spring — mainly from above-ground;
• at any sowing dates, underground shoot formation predominates.

When sown in autumn, it flowers 1.5 months after complete snow melt and continues until harvest. When sown in spring — 60-65 days after emergence. Flowering is extended.

Hairy vetch is a typical entomophile. Pollination occurs mainly by honey bees and bumblebees.

Stems grow relatively quickly. Their greatest growth occurs in the period from budding to the end of flowering. Maximum average daily accumulation of dry mass is noted in the flowering phase.

The transition from flowering to fruit formation is unclear, since the phases overlap each other. Ripening usually occurs 30-40 days after flowering.

Agricultural technology

Hairy vetch is usually grown as a winter crop in mixture with winter grain crops. It is also sown in spring and summer in mixture with spring cereals.

In the forest-steppe zone, hairy vetch and its mixtures are placed after early-harvested cereals and grain legumes, maize for green fodder.

For green fodder, hairy vetch is sown in mixture with rye in occupied fallow or as a stubble crop after harvesting winter crops. Stubble sowings are effective in the south of the country with a warm, long autumn and sufficient precipitation.

For seeds, it is better to place it in a fodder, vegetable, or farm-adjacent crop rotation so as not to infest the following crop with volunteer plants. When placing seed sowings in a field crop rotation, perennial grasses are undersown under it. In this case, vetch seedlings appearing from volunteer plants will develop together with the undersown grasses and will be harvested together with the perennial grasses. In some cases, after harvesting hairy vetch for seeds, annual grasses or row crops are sown, which help clean the field from fallen seeds.

In the steppe of Ukraine, growing hairy vetch with winter wheat often gives a higher yield of green mass than in mixture with rye or barley. In Ciscarpathia, it is sown in mixtures with rye or winter rapeseed. A mixture of hairy vetch with winter rapeseed allows obtaining green fodder 7-12 days earlier than in mixture with winter rye.

Fertilization

Hairy vetch reacts poorly to increased soil acidity. Therefore, liming leads to increased yields of hay and seeds. For example, liming of soil at 0.5 hydrolytic acidity increased the yield of vetch-rye mixture by 27.6% (VNII of Feed).

Mineral fertilizers increase plant winter hardiness. Thus, application before pre-sowing cultivation of 250 kg/ha of superphosphate, 100 kg/ha of potassium chloride, and 150 kg/ha of ammonium nitrate increased the winter hardiness of hairy vetch. Over 2-3 years, the number of plants surviving after overwintering in the fertilized variant averaged 89.2%, in the control — 57.3% (Research Institute of Agriculture of the Central Regions of the Non-Chernozem Zone).

Phosphorus-potassium fertilizers help increase the yield of vetch, nitrogen fertilizers — of cereal components.

In the Non-Chernozem Zone, under a vetch-rye mixture, pre-sowing phosphorus-potassium fertilizers are recommended at a rate of P₆₀K₆₀. In spring, N_30-45 is applied as top dressing. In general cases, P₃₀K₃₀ is applied for the main treatment, P_10-15 at sowing in rows, and N_20-30 in spring as top dressing.

Hairy vetch is responsive to organic fertilizers. For example, application of 20-30 t/ha of manure increased the share of vetch in the yield by 16.2% (Chernigov Agricultural Experimental Station). If winter vetch-cereal mixtures are grown as fallow-occupying crops, up to 40 t/ha of manure is applied under them.

Soil treatment

When sowing in autumn, the usual system of fallow tillage is used. When sowing in spring — autumn tillage and pre-sowing spring cultivation with harrowing.

Sowing

Sowing of hairy vetch begins 2 weeks before the optimal sowing date of winter rye; the latter is sown after vetch emergence. Simultaneous sowing of vetch and rye at the optimal date for the latter does not allow vetch to develop sufficiently well and leads to its almost complete death in the winter period. The same recommendation applies to winter wheat and triticale.

The best sowing date for fodder in the forest-steppe zone is considered to be August 15-20. Cereal components in this zone can be sown simultaneously with it, but can also be sown after its emergence.

Recommended sowing rates in autumn for the Non-Chernozem Zone are 100 kg/ha of hairy vetch and 60 kg/ha of winter rye; in Ukraine and the North Caucasus — 60-80 kg/ha of vetch and winter rye seeds.

When sowing hairy vetch in mixture with oats in spring, the recommended sowing rate for vetch is 120 kg/ha, oats 80 kg/ha. The mixture is sown at the earliest dates.

In the forest-steppe and steppe zones, when grown for fodder, the recommended sowing rate is 2 million pcs./ha, or 60 kg/ha of vetch seeds and 2 million pcs./ha of winter cereals.

Mixtures of hairy vetch with maize or sunflower are sown with row spacing of 45 cm.

Seed placement depth is 4-6 cm followed by rolling.

Crop care

Depending on the condition of plants emerging from under the snow, spring soil treatment consists of loosening with medium harrows in one pass or, with poor development, with rotary hoes.

Hairy vetch, like other grain legumes, is often affected by fungal diseases. Complete death of sowings is rare, but yield reduction can reach 20-30%.

The main diseases of this crop include ascochyta blight, powdery mildew, downy mildew, rust, and gray mold. The main role in the system of disease control measures is given to agronomic practices:

• creation of a good agronomic background;
• timely and high-quality soil treatment;
• liming of acidic soils;
• application of phosphorus-potassium fertilizers;
• crop rotation;
• weed control;
• selection of varieties;
• sowing of mixtures;
• harvesting at optimal times;
• cleaning and drying of seeds.

In disease control, seed treatment is effective, carried out in the same way as for grain legumes.

The main pests of hairy vetch include the nodule weevil, Phytonomus, vetch striped and bristly weevils, bean seed beetle, meadow moth caterpillars, gamma cutworms, and vetch aphid. Control measures include agronomic and sometimes chemical methods.

Harvesting

For fodder purposes, hairy vetch can be used from the beginning of flowering until the formation of green pods. Harvesting is completed before the beginning of heading of the cereal component. In the green fodder conveyor, the mixture of vetch with rye is harvested first, then with triticale, and finally with wheat.

If hairy vetch predominates in the herbage, harvesting for fodder is better started during its flowering, ending at the beginning of fruit formation. If the share of vetch in the herbage is less than 40%, harvesting is better started taking into account the development of cereal components, since the onset of the heading phase sharply reduces the palatability of the fodder mass by animals.

The vetch-rye mixture sown before winter is usually harvested for green fodder in the Non-Chernozem Zone at the end of May, in Ukraine — at the beginning of May.

When harvesting for hay, it is recommended to dry the wilted mass by active ventilation, since ordinary field drying is associated with large losses from shedding of hairy vetch leaflets.

Seed production

For seeds, hairy vetch is sown in pure form or in mixture with a winter cereal crop.

For rapid seed propagation, wide-row sowings with row spacing of 30-45 cm are used. The sowing rate is 20-30 kg/ha. Good yields are obtained at a sowing rate of 2 million pcs./ha of germinating vetch and wheat seeds.

Rye suppresses vetch more strongly and overtakes it in development, therefore it is less preferable in seed plots.

Seed yield increases with the application of phosphorus-potassium fertilizers. For example, with the application of phosphorus-potassium fertilizers, the seed yield of vetch increased on average over 5 years from 660 to 820 kg/ha.

Before sowing, seeds are treated with bacterial preparations (pea rhizotorphin).

Seed plots are more often harvested by two-phase harvesting. Harvesting begins when 50-60% of pods in the lower clusters ripen, since ripening in hairy vetch is extended, and overripe pods easily crack. To prevent large losses, threshing of windrows is carried out after 1-2 days.

According to other recommendations, hairy vetch for seeds is harvested during the ripening period of rye or winter wheat. By this time, as a rule, the share of ripened vetch pods is 75-80%.

Direct combining can also be used with uniform ripening of pods.

Seeds can be obtained from the second cut. Sometimes this is done to prevent mass spread of pests. In this case, on developed sowings at the beginning of the budding phase, the first cut is made, collecting 6-8 t/ha of green mass. Under favorable weather conditions, plants regrow well, flower, and manage to produce a full seed yield.

Seeds obtained from mixed sowings with winter cereals are easily separated on gravity separators and indented cylinders. If necessary, seeds are dried and placed for storage.

Varieties

List of sources

1. Vavilov P. P., Gritsenko V. V., Kuznetsov V. S. et al. (1986). Plant Growing. Edited by Vavilov P. P. 5th ed., revised and enlarged. Moscow: Agropromizdat.
2. Kolomeichenko V. V. (2007). Plant Growing/Textbook. Moscow: Agrobusinesscenter.
3. Niklyaev V. S. (2000). Fundamentals of Agricultural Production Technology. Agriculture and Plant Growing. Moscow: "Bylina".