Journal of Plant Science Current Research Category: Agriculture Type: Research Article
Comparative study of M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survival rates in Central Namibia
- Morlu Korsor1, Charles Ntahonshikira2*, Haruna M Bello3, Habauka M Kwaambwa4
- 1 Department Of Animal Science, University Of Namibia, Windhoek, Namibia
- 2 Department Of Pathobiology, University Of Namibia, Windhoek, Namibia
- 3 Department Of Agricultural Economics, University Of Namibia, Windhoek, Namibia
- 4 Department Of Natural And Applied Sciences, Namibia University Of Science And Technology, Windhoek, Namibia
*Corresponding Author:
Charles NtahonshikiraDepartment Of Pathobiology, University Of Namibia, Windhoek, Namibia
Tel:+ 264 612063815,
Email:cntahonshikira@unam.na
Received Date: Jun 03, 2017 Accepted Date: Oct 11, 2017 Published Date: Oct 25, 2017
Abstract
Keywords
INTRODUCTION
Namibia is a semi-arid and drought-pruned country [4,5]. The vegetation patterns of Namibia mostly depend on the type of climate in a particular part of the country. In the central, west and south, the vegetation types are Acacia tree-and-shrub savannah and dwarf shrub savanna [6]. Drought-resistant plants like M. oleifera, which Morton [7] described as a boon to arid lands can grow and survive in such environments. Moringa is widely adapted to the tropics and subtropics [8]. Moringa oleifera is a fast-growing and drought-resistant tree that is native to the Southern foothills of Himalayans in Northern India [9]. Moringa ovalifolia, a native tree to Namibia and Angola is well adopted to its native semi-arid and drought-pruned environment physiologically, which can be seen in its roots systems as discussed by Morlu Korsor et al., and Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Forestry [10,11].
Moringa is the only genus from the Moringaceae family [12,13]. Table 1 shows the taxonomic classification of Moringa.
Kingdom | Plantae | Plants |
Subkingdom | Tracheobionta | Vascular plant |
Super division | Spermatophyta | Seed plant |
Division | Magnoliophyta | Flowering plant |
Class | Eudicots | Dicotyledons |
Subclass | Rosids | ---- |
Order | Brassicales | ---- |
Family | Moringaceae | Horse-radish tree family |
Genus | Moringa | Horse-radish tree |
There are 13 known species of the sole genus Moringa, which belonging to the Moringaceae family. These species are divided into three groups based on the shapes of their trunks: slender trees, bottle trees and tuberous shrubs. Moringa oleifera of India, Moringa concanensis of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, and Moringa peregrina of Arabia, Red Sea area, Egypt, Sinai, Israel and Sudan belong to the slender trees. Moringao valifolia of Namibia and Angola, Moringa drouhardii and Moringa hildebrandtii of Madagascar; Moringa stenopetala of Ethiopia and Kenya belong to the bottle trees. And the last group include Moringa arborea of Kenya; M. rivae of Kenya and Ethiopia; Moring aborziana of Kenya and Somalia, Moringa pygmaea of Somalia; Moringa longituba of Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia; and Moringa ruspoliana of Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia which belong to tuberous shrubs and trees of Northeast Africa [9,12,13,15,16]. Although Moringa has such many species, M. oleifera is the most adapted plant worldwide compared to other species. It has also been established that of the known species, M. oleifera is also the most widely known [16]. Many studies have been done on its uses and numerous beneficial properties in the plant kingdom [9,17]. On the other hand, M. ovalifolia roots, bark and wood are eaten by goats and trees also browsed by giraffe [3]. It is less known and studied in comparison to M. oleifera.
The problem is that Namibia is both arid and semi-arid country with very cold winter season that occurs every year and affects rangeland productivity especially trees and grasses that support the livestock production. Sijssens [18] discussed thatthe cultivation of plantations of drought-tolerant fodder shrubs should become a priority in the Namibian rangelands to improve their productivity. However, Namibia being described as the driest climate country in Sub-Saharan Africa by Schalkwyk and Agra Professional Services [19,20], trees cultivation and survival are challenged by the harsh climatic conditions (winter and drought). Therefore, M. oleifera, which is very easy to establish and highly adaptable tree [21] would serve the purpose of Namibia’s rangeland improvement through its incorporation into rangelands along with M. ovalifolia, which is to some extent slower growing and less productive at first but very highly drought-tolerant tree.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Study Site
The vegetation of central Namibia is characterized as open savanna vegetation with a continuous grass and herb layer and a more or less dense shrub layer.Thorny shrubs, mostly Acacia species, may form very dense stands with only little understorey growth [5,6]. Neudamm Farmbeing in central Namibia, the vegetation is classified as highland savanna (semi-arid savanna) and characterized by grasses, shrubs and trees that are well spread over the farm. An annual grass like Melinis repens and perennial grass like Schmidtia pappophoporoides, Anthephora pubescens and Brachiaria nigropedata are well represented on the farm. Different types of trees like Acacia brownii, Acacia erioloba, Acacia mellifera as well as shrubs like Greviaflava are found on Neudamm Farm. The estimated carrying capacity is about 12 hectares per large stock unit or 45kg per hectare biomass [5,25-27].
Field preparation and seedlings’ transplantation
Watering of trees
Application of fertilizers
Data collection procedures and analysis
Data collected were analysed using General Linear Models (GLM) Pairwise Comparisons in which the number of survived Moringa trees were used as dependent variables while Moringa species were used as independent variables to test the level of survival rates based on species. Means comparison was used to derive descriptive statistics. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS® version 23) was used to carry out the statistical analysis while Microsoft Excel® version 13 were used to compare the two Moringa species survival rates as well as the years in figures.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Soil composition of the field
Type of Analysis | Sample No. | ||
Units | 0-30 cm Depth | 30-60 cm Depth | |
pH | 7.22 | 7.67 | |
Electrical Conductivity or Soluble Salts (EC) | µS/cm | 80 | 87 |
Organic Matter (OM) | % | 0.87 | 0.65 |
Phosphorus (P) | ppm | 24.60 | 12.30 |
Potassium (K) | ppm | 295 | 384 |
Calcium (Ca) | ppm | 572 | 586 |
Magnesium (Mg) | ppm | 95 | 107 |
Sodium (Na) | ppm | 5 | 8 |
Texture | ---- | Loamy sand | Loamy sand |
Sand | % | 84.2 | 82.1 |
Silt | % | 8.2 | 9.7 |
Clay | % | 7.6 | 8.1 |
Survival rates of Moringa species after 2014 winter season

A Pairwise Comparison test was conducted to determine the statistical difference between M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survival rates after the 2014 winter season (Table 3). The survived trees (sprouted trees) were used as dependent variables while the Moringa species were used as independent variables for the analysis. There result shows no significant difference (P < 0.05) between M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survival rates of trees after 2014 winter season, an indication that both Moringa species had similar survival rates as seen in figure 1.
(I) Moringa spp. | (J) Moringa spp. | Mean Difference (I-J) | Std. Error | Sig.a | 95% Confidence Interval for Differencea | |
Lower Bound | Upper Bound | |||||
M. oleifera | M. ovalifolia | 6.585 | 15.855 | 0.692 | -32.210 | 45.380 |
M. ovalifolia | M. oleifera | -6.585 | 15.855 | 0.692 | -45.380 | 32.210 |
The descriptive statistics for M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survival rates after the 2014 winter season is found in table 4 in which the number of cases, mean, standard deviation, standard error of the mean, minimum and maximum were considered. M. oleifera had a mean of 61.67 with a maximum of 70.83% survival rate, while M. ovalifolia had a mean of 55 with a maximum of 81.25% survival rate. A study conducted by Korsor et al., [10] with M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia seedlings had 81.56% survival rate for M. ovalifolia and 93.33% for M. oleifera, which concurs with the present study M. ovalifolia survival rate but higher than M. oleifera in this study.
Moringa spp. | N | Mean | Std. Deviation | Std. Error of Mean | Minimum | Maximum |
M. oleifera | 4 | 61.67 | 7.01 | 3.52 | 55.00 | 70.83 |
M. ovalifolia | 4 | 55.08 | 30.92 | 15.46 | 15.63 | 81.25 |
Figure 2 shows a global humidity index map in which Namibia is shown as semi-arid and arid country. Figure 3 shows pictures of M. oleifera at the beginning and the end 2015 winter; while figure 4 are pictures of M. ovalifolia at the beginning and end of 2015 winter season. The pictures clearly how much damage winter imposes on the trees every season. This led to mortality of many trees after winter.



Survival rates of Moringa trees after 2015 winter season

Table 5 presents a GLM Pairwise Comparison test of Moringa species survival rates after 2015 winter season. The survived trees (sprouted trees) were used as dependent variables while the Moringa species were used as independent variables for the analysis. The test result reveals a significant difference (P < 0.05) between M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survival rates. Although planted in the same orchard and environmental conditions, each Moringa species survived the 2015 winter season at different rate (Figure 5).
(I) Moringa spp. | (J) Moringa spp. | Mean Difference (I-J) | Std. Error | Sig.b | 95% Confidence Interval for Differenceb | |
Lower Bound | Upper Bound | |||||
M. oleifera | M. ovalifolia | 25.868* | 5.404 | 0.003 | 12.645 | 39.090 |
M. ovalifolia | M. oleifera | -25.868* | 5.404 | 0.003 | -39.090 | -12.645 |
Based on estimated marginal means
b-Adjustment for multiple comparisons: Bonferroni.
The descriptive statistics of Moringa species survival rates after the 2015 winter season is found in table 6. The statistics shows the means of 97.50 and 71.63 with maxima of 97.5% and 82.69% survival rates for M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia, respectively. Moringa oleifera sprouted at once in 2015 causing it to have zero standard deviation and standard error of the mean, while M. ovalifoliahad a gradual sprouting with 10.80 standard deviation and 5.40 standard error of the mean.
Moringa spp. | N | Mean | Std. Deviation | Std. Error of Mean | Minimum | Maximum |
M. oleifera | 4 | 97.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 97.50 | 97.50 |
M. ovalifolia | 4 | 71.63 | 10.81 | 5.40 | 57.69 | 82.69 |
Survival rates of Moringa trees after 2016 winter season

A GLM Pairwise Comparison test of Moringa species survival rates after the 2016 winter season is seen in table 7. During the analysis, the survived (sprouted) trees were used as dependent variables while the Moringa species were used as independent variables. The test result shows that there was no significant different (P < 0.05) between M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survival rates after the 2016 winter season. This may be attributed to the ages of the trees (Figure 6) in comparison to the first and second winter (2014 and 2015) seasons when the trees were younger with less roots systems establishment as discussed by Foth and Larcher [2,30].
(I) Moringa spp. | (J) Moringa spp. | Mean Difference (I-J) | Std. Error | Sig.a | 95% Confidence Interval for Differencea | |
Lower Bound | Upper Bound | |||||
M. oleifera | M. ovalifolia | 15.023 | 33.520 | 0.670 | -66.997 | 97.042 |
M. ovalifolia | M. oleifera | -15.023 | 33.520 | 0.670 | -97.042 | 66.997 |
Based on estimated marginal means
a-Adjustment for multiple comparisons: Bonferroni.
Table 8 presents descriptive statistics of Moringa species survival rates after the 2016 winter season which includes the number, means, standard deviation, standard error of the mean, minimum and maximum. The two Moringa species had equal survival rates after the 2016 winter season with maximum of 99.19 % and 100% for M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia, respectively.
Moringa spp. | N | Mean | Std. Deviation | Std. Error of Mean | Minimum | Maximum |
M. oleifera | 4 | 72.92 | 48.69 | 24.34 | 0.00 | 99.17 |
M. ovalifolia | 4 | 57.90 | 46.08 | 23.04 | 0.00 | 100.00 |
Figure 7 presents photographs of M. oleifera (A) and M. ovalifolia (B) sprouting in the middle of the 2016 winter season, while figure 8 shows photographs of M. oleifera roots (A) and M. ovalifolia roots (B) after the 2016 winter. As the trees grew older and bigger with firmed root-system establishment in 2016, they were less affected by winter and whenever temperatures improved, they sprouted immediately even in the middle of winter, which reduced the mortality rates. Moringa oleifera grows rapidly even in poor soils, arid and/or dry lands [7,38], which from observation shows that M. ovalifolia grows in poor soil, arid, and/or dry lands as well since both Moringa species grew under the same adverse environmental conditions.


Moringa spp. | 2014TotalSurvivedTrees | 2014% Trees | 2015TotalSurvivedTrees | 2015% Trees | 2016TotalSurvivedTrees | 2016% Trees | Averageof totalSurvivedTrees | % TotalSurvivedTrees |
M. oleifera | 85 | 70.83 | 117 | 97.50 | 119 | 99.17 | 107 | 89.17 |
M. ovalifolia | 52 | 81.25 | 43 | 82.69 | 20 | 100 | 38 | 87.98 |
Table 9: Total and percent survived of Moringa trees after 2014, 2015 and 2016 winter seasons.
MORTALITY RATES OF MORINGA TREES DUE TO WINTER SEASON
Moringa spp. | 2014Dead Trees | 2014% Dead Trees | 2015Dead Trees | 2015% dead Trees | 2016Dead Trees | 2016% dead Trees | Total Dead Trees | Total % Dead Trees |
M. oleifera | 35 | 29.16 | 3 | 2.5 | 1 | 0.83 | 39 | 32.5 |
M. ovalifolia | 12 | 18.75 | 9 | 17.3 | 0 | 0 | 21 | 32.8 |
Both M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia survived well even though M. oleiferais exotic to Namibia. (Al et al., 2013) [21] elucidated that originally Moringa is considered as a tree of hot semi-arid regions, which is adaptable to a wide range of environmental conditions; from hot to dry, humid and wet conditions. The tree is tolerant to light frosts, but does not survive as a perennial under freezing condition. Moringa is quite drought tolerant and is well suited for a wide range of adverse environments that would not be suitable for other fruit, nut and tree crops.
CONCLUSION
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
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Citation:Korsor M, Ntahonshikira C, Bello HM, Kwaambwa HM (2017) Comparative Study of M. oleifera and M. ovalifolia Survival Rates in Central Namibia. J Plant Sci Curr Res 1: 001
Copyright: © 2017 Morlu Korsor, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
