Acacia Albida Del.: A Potential Species For Nitrogen Fixation

Abstract

Nitrogen-fixing trees have high potential for land reclamation and soil enrichment. In Morogoro, Tanzania, Hogberg and Kvarnstrom (1982) estimated that four-year-old Leucaena leucocephala could fix about 110 kg per hectare per year elemental nitrogen. Langkamp et al.(1970) found that the total nitrogen fixation each wet season was about 12 kg per hectare where the planting density was 1110 trees per hectare. Despite the many tropical African tree species which possibly fix nitrogen, there is so far no information available on their actual nitrogenfixing capacity. This is an area of research hithrto neglected in studies of afforestation but with current awareness of the need to improve deteriorating soils it needs attention. There are many hardwood leguminous species availabe