Competitive ability of leguminous plants againts parthenium weed

This thesis present a method of biological control of Parthenium weed in malaysia. The objectives of this study were to investigate the competitive ability of locally available leguminous plant against Parthenium hysterophorus population and to screen out the best leguminous plant which can be used for controling their nuisance weed espesially in roadsides and follow land. Three leguminous plant such as Mucuna plant (Mucuna brateata), coffee weed (Cassia occidentalis) and white clover (Trifolium repens) were grown in monoculture treatment and in mixture with Parthenium weed, monoculture of parthenium weed was also maintauned. The competitive ability of the test plants were measured by determining the aggressivity value against parthenium weed. Coffee weed show the positive value of aggressivity (0.17) followed by Mucuna Plants (0.09). However, white clover it had negative value (-0.03) and was less aggressive compared to parthenium weed. Use of coffee weed and Mucuna plants has been suggested to use in the parthenium infested area to replace the weed.