Determining the best Lentil (Lens culinaris) and Mustard (Brassica campestris) Intercrop Combination to Improve Biomass Yield and Economic Returns on the Yield in Southern Region of Bangladesh

Intercropping is a traditional practice in Bangladesh. It increases total productivity per unit area through maximum utilization of land, labor and growth resources. Growing two or more crops in combination is called intercropping where intra and inter specific competition occurs (Spilter, 1983). The success of intercropping thus depends mostly on the complementary or competitive behaviors (Nazir et al., 1988, Chandrasekhar et al.,1988) of the component crops. Competitiveness of component crops depends to a large degree on each crops response to the limiting factors (Fukai and Trenbath, 1993). Therefore, intercropping is considered to be very efficient technique in maximizing the production per unit area and it gives higher resource use efficiency (Hashem and Moniruzzaman, 1986; Quayyum et al.,1999). It also increases land equivalent ratio (LER) to varying degrees (Mehta and De, 1980; Hashem et al.,1990). Lentil and mustard two most important crops in Bangladesh are usually grown as sole and intercrop. Lentil is one of most valuable cash crop grown for domestic as well as export purpose. By adopting appropriate planting geometry in the intercropping system,the total productivity can be increased (Umrani et al., 1984). Successful intercropping system gives higher cash return total production per unit area and diversifies production system than growing sole crop (Kurata 1966; Khaliq et al.,1997) and provides greater resource use efficiency (Pathic&Mulla, 1979). Several workers also reported higher economic advantage in intercropping than sole cropping (Mandalet al.,2004; Khaliq et al.,1997; Hossain and Bari, 1996). Proper row arrangement of lentil and mustard under intercropping system can ensure higher productivity and economic return. The review of research work done sofar indicated that growth of mustard as intercrop is more beneficial than growing lentil alone in many situations (Aravazhi et al., 1997; Natarajan, 1992, Sadashiv, 2004). However, literature relating optimum plant population of mustard for intercropping with lentil is meager. Hence this experiment was undertaken to find out the optimum plant population of mustard in association with lentil for achieving higher productivity.