R.M. JONES

Division of Tropical Crops and Pastures, CSIRO, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Abstract

A small area of Arachis pintoi cv. Amarillo was established in 1984 in each of 3 farm pastures at Samford, south-eastern Queensland. On one soil, the original plants of Amarillo persisted poorly (with a half-life of only 4 months), there was little seed set, and the stand died out. This is attributed to poor soil physical, and possibly chemical, conditions. On the other 2 sites the original plants had a half-life of just over 2 years and there was a build up in soil seed reserves over 8 years to 250–450 seeds/m². In another 10-year-old sowing at Samford, seed reserves had increased to 1000/m². Good stands of Amarillo had 15–40 m of stolon per m² with 60–400 roots > 1 mm diameter per m². Most of these roots were primary taproots that resulted from seedling recruitment.
Amarillo has good attributes for persistence in grazed pastures as it has a prostrate growth habit, perennial crowns, sets seed under grazing and is able to root from stolons.