Can intercropping alter cereal grains dietary fiber composition?
Estonian University of Life Sciences, Institute of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Chair of Crop Science and Plant Biology, Fr.R. Kreutzwaldi 1, EE51014 Tartu, Estonia
*Correspondence: evelin.loit@emu.ee
Abstract:
Barley and oats are essential cereal grains that contribute to satisfying the consumer’s need for dietary fibers, namely arabinoxylans (AX) and beta-glucans (BG). Due to the increasing popularity of intercropping as an environmentally friendly and low-cost approach to sustainable intensification of agriculture and crop production, it is important to understand the relationship between mixed cropping on cereal grains’ dietary fiber content. Therefore, the effect of intercropping barley and oat with vetch and field pea was studied compared to pure sown barley and oat on grain AX and BG content in two successive years (2022‒2023). Our result showed that oat had consistently higher AX content while barley demonstrated greater BG content. Intercropping had an influence only on barley grains’ BG content, but contrary to our hypothesis, intercropping with vetch decreased the overall concentration of BG when compared to barley pure stand, as vetch was a too competitive partner. We found that grain quality parameters, such as thousand kernel weight and test weight, were positively associated with higher BG content in barley grains. Over a two-year period, weather conditions had an impact only on BG content in intercropped treatments. Increased precipitation decreased BG content in oat and barley in 2022 compared to 2023. Both grains AX content was not affected by intercropping or annual growing conditions.
Key words:
arabinoxylan, barley, beta-glucan, intercropping, oat