How leguminous plants help in increasing …

Legumes are plants that have nodules that contain rhizobia bacteria. These bacteria have the ability to fix/ incorporate free atmospheric nitrogen into the soil. This they do by converting the nitrogen in the atmosphere into nitrates and nitrites that can be used up as plant nutrients. The legumes are thus very important plants in the field in providing nitrogen nutrient in the soil.

Crops such as cereals or grass plants,on the other hand, do not have this ability of fixing nitrogen into the soil. Therefore, what happens is that the cereals depend on either nitrogen that has been fixed by leguminous plants in the soil or from nitrogenous fertilizers.

This is why farmers usually plant leguminous plants with other non leguminous plants such as grass plants, that the grass plants may benefit from the nitrogen fixed by the leguminous plants.