What are the importance of marigold in agriculture?
Marigold
Marigolds are ornamental plants which are available with either of yellow, orange or copper-brown flowers. These plants are cultivated mainly for ornamental value worldwide. There are 129 species of marigold can find worldwide from mainly two different genera i.e. genera tagetes and genera calendula.
Genera Tagetes are from sunflower (Asteraceae) family which are mostly annual or sometime perennial, mostly herbaceous plants. These plants are native to America which are growing naturally from the southwestern United States into South America, but some species naturally growing around the other part of world as well.
Genera Calendula are also belongs to sunflower (Asteraceae) family and are commonly known as pot marigold, ruddles, common and scotch marigolds. These are probably native to southern Europe, however, the history of calendula are still unknown.
Marigold has been valued for cultural and religious significance in Nepal since ancient time.Mostly tagetes are grown widely in Nepal for these cultural and religious value. These flowers are use to offer to god and goddess, use to worship and garlands are widely used in many rituals and social functions. such as Tihar. Tihar festival almost incomplete without the marigold flower. Therefore, marigold already a valued plant in Nepal from religious, social and cultural significances.
Beside the cultural and religious significance there are other agricultural and medicinal benefits of this plant which is under shadow in Nepalese agriculture system.
Agricultural benefits of marigold
1. Marigolds act as natural pesticide
In an agriculture system, one of the important and economic enemy are soil borne pests such as nematodes. Thousands and more nematodes species live in soil, even though most of them are beneficial, some of them are highly harmful. These nematodes feed on the plant roots and cause yield loss in plants. To get rid of these harmful nematodes from our agricultural land, growing marigold will help. Marigold provides a natural defense against the ill-effect of these harmful nematodes. Therefore, intercropping marigold with nematode susceptible crop of that season will help to prevent the nematode infestation.
2. Marigold controls insects
Insects are another major problem in agriculture. In many cases, insects can cause huge damage to the growing plant as well as the harvested seeds as well. Marigolds are often known as insect repellent. marigolds have specific ability to repel harmful aphids, white flies and bug suc as French marigolds repel whiteflies and Mexican marigolds offend a host of destructive insects. Marigolds, attract ladybug beetles, parasitic wasps, hoverflies and other beneficial insects towards it's flower and protect other agricultural plants from harmful aphids and bugs such as aphids, Japanese beetles, snails, spider mites, Mexican bean beetles, squash bugs, and tomato hornworms.
3. Marigold is larger pest controller
Larger agricultural pest such as deer, rabbits and other pest can be controlled by growing marigold in field. Wild rabbit and deers does not like the smell of predators or death. The marigold have special kind of deterrents and pungent smell, these deterrents are perceive by wild pest as danger and does not liked by these rabbits and deers. Therefore, we can grow marigold in pest prone area to protect main crop.
4. Marigold as supplement to poultry feed
- For organic and sustainable agricultural development, marigold helps farmers a lot to control insects, pest as well as to produce poultry supplements. Therefore, if we going for organic farming/natural farming and/or farmers do not have access to insecticides and pesticides, marigold will be another opportunity. Therefore, let's go with our own traditional plants and make our agricultural system thriving and divergent.
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