-Annual crops are short lived plants, living only for a year. They flower, produce seed at the end of this cycle, and then die down. About 80% of food crops are annuals.
-Their survival/reproduction strategy is that of“live fast and die young”.
-Annuals reproduce from seed, and grow very quickly compared to perennials. To do this, they require very large amounts of available soil nutrients to support their rapid growth rates and be able to produce -large quantities of seeds as a survival strategy.
-In fitting with this growth strategy, annual plants have very shallow roots. Annual crops usually have the majority of their root mass in the first 6” (15cm) of soil. This is why you can grow almost any annual vegetables in fairly shallow garden beds and containers around 40-50cm deep.
Important and common annual crops
Major annual crops grown can be categorized as follows:
-Cereals:
Maize,
Wheat,
Sorghum,
Millet
-Legumes
Dry or common beans
Cowpea
Chickpea
Pegion pea
-Oil crops
Sunflower
Ground nuts
Fiber
Cotton
-Stimulant crops
Tobacco
Root and tuber crops
Sweet potatoes
Cassava
Titany answered the question on August 16, 2021 at 06:44