Agronomic comparison of beans Phaseolus and Vigna genera with the common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.

Abstract

A series of four experiments was carried out under field conditions in Viçosa and Ponte Nova, in the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil, two of them during the «rainy growing season» (spring and summer) and two during the «dry growing season» (fall). The aim of the study was to compare the performance of the common bean with that of the following grain legumes: P. lunatus (lima bean, cv. GL 355), V. unguiculata (cowpea, cvs. EPACE-6 and CNC 0434), V. radiata (mungbean, cvs. GL 388 and KY 2013), V. umbellata (rice bean, cvs. E-7 and E-18) and V. angularis (adzuki bean, cvs. Kintoki and Dainagon). It was found that lima bean, rice bean, cowpea, and mungbean are promising species for the rainy growing season. In the dry growing season, lima bean and rice bean stood out in Viçosa, these two species, plus cowpea, performed well in Ponte Nova. In the rainy growing season the species life cycles varied from 69 days (adzuki bean) to 118 days (cowpea and mungbean); in the dry growing season, the life cycles varied from 89 (common bean) to 126 days (cowpea). Common bean maturation was more uniform than that of lima bean, rice bean, and adzuki bean. Rice bean pods presented a high degree of dehiscence. Rice bean adzuki bean were not attacked by foliar diseases. Leaf-cutting ants (Atta sexdens rubropilosa) were attracted by cowpea and principally by mungbean plants, cutting the stems of young plants or the leaves of older plants.