- Title
- Growth and fruit production of Sclerocarya birrea in the South African lowveld
- Creator
- Shackleton, Charlie M
- Subject
- To be catalogued
- Date
- 2002
- Type
- text
- Type
- article
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10962/181618
- Identifier
- vital:43752
- Identifier
- xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1020579213024"
- Description
- Sclerocarya birrea (A.Rich.) Hochst. subsp. caffra (Sond.) Kokwaro. is a common species throughout the semiarid, deciduous savannas of much of sub-Saharan Africa. It is a favoured species and is frequently maintained in homestead plots and arable fields in an agroforestry situation. Although the abundance and popularity of this species has led to several initiatives to commercialise a number of marula products, the sustainability of the resource base with respect to fruit production has not been considered. This paper reports on a field experiment that monitored growth rates and fruit production of a sample of adult trees from several wild populations. Mean fruit production was 36.8 kg per tree in the first year, and negligible in the second. This was considerably less than previous estimates, which were based largely on small samples or anecdotal reports. The maximum recorded yield was 416.6 kg per tree. Fruit production was positively related to the size of the tree. Growth rates of adult trees were slow. There was a strong positive relationship between mean annual diameter increment and stem diameter. The slow growth rates and low fruit yields indicate that more attention is required regarding the sustainability of there source and its ability to provide sufficient fruit for the growing subsistence and commercial demand at both local and national scales.
- Format
- computer, online resource, application/pdf, 1 online resource (6 pages), pdf
- Publisher
- SpringerLink
- Language
- English
- Relation
- Agroforestry Systems, Shackleton, C., 2002. Growth and fruit production of Sclerocarya birrea in the South African lowveld. Agroforestry systems, 55(3), pp.175-180, Agroforestry Systems volume 55 number 3 p. 175 2002 1572-9680
- Rights
- Publisher
- Rights
- Use of this resource is governed by the terms and conditions of the SpringerLink Terms of Use Statement ( https://link.springer.com/termsandconditions)
- Rights
- Open Access
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Collections
Shackleton, Charles Michael (Distinguished Prof)
RU Department of Environmental Science
SDG 15. Life On Land
| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details | SOURCE1 | Growth and fruit production of Sclerocarya birrea in the South African lowveld.pdf | 90 KB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details |