Growing two or more crops in the same field but in different rows is called

Correct — B, Inter cropping. Intercropping means growing two or more crops together on the same field in a definite row pattern — a few rows of one crop alternating with a few rows of another, as with soybean and pigeon pea, or groundnut and sunflower. The defined arrangement is what separates it from mixed cropping, where the seeds are simply sown together without any pattern.

• (a)Crop rotation — Crop rotation is a sequence in time, not a pattern in space. Different crops are grown on the same land one after another across seasons, which is a different practice altogether.
• (c)Alternate cropping — Alternate cropping is not the standard term for this, and to the extent it is used it also describes crops following one another in time rather than sharing a field.
• (d)Kharif cropping — Kharif refers to the monsoon-sown season — paddy, maize, cotton, groundnut — and names a season, not a way of arranging crops in a field.

Multiple cropping practices are sorted by how they use space and time. Mixed cropping puts two crops in the same field with no arrangement, spreading risk. Intercropping puts them in the same field in a defined row pattern, so each can be sown, weeded, sprayed and harvested separately. Crop rotation puts different crops on the same land in successive seasons, which is what maintains soil fertility.

Intercropping is designed around complementarity. A cereal paired with a legume gains nitrogen fixed by the legume's root nodules, a tall crop shelters a short one, and crops with different root depths draw on different layers of soil. The definite pattern also has an operational point: because the rows are separate, a farmer can apply fertiliser or pesticide to one crop without dosing the other, and can harvest them at different times. Mixed cropping gives up that control in exchange for simplicity.

• Intercropping is growing two or more crops simultaneously on the same field in a definite row pattern.
• Mixed cropping is the same simultaneity without any pattern, which is the distinction examiners test.
• Crop rotation is a succession of crops on the same land over different seasons.
• A cereal-legume intercrop benefits from the nitrogen fixed in the legume's root nodules.
• Kharif crops are sown with the monsoon and harvested in autumn; rabi crops are sown in winter and harvested in spring.

• Reading crop rotation, which is sequential, as a way of sharing a field.
• Missing the definite row pattern, which is the only thing separating intercropping from mixed cropping.
• Treating kharif and rabi as cropping systems when they name seasons.

A term-to-definition item. The examiner varies one phrase — 'in different rows', 'in a definite pattern', 'without any pattern' — and the answer moves with it.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Growing two or more crops together in the same field with no definite row arrangement is called

  • (a)intercropping
  • (b)mixed cropping
  • (c)crop rotation
  • (d)mixed farming

  Answer(b) mixed cropping — the absence of a pattern is exactly what separates it from intercropping.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  A cereal is often intercropped with a legume mainly because the legume

  • (a)shades the cereal from sunlight
  • (b)fixes atmospheric nitrogen through its root nodules
  • (c)absorbs excess water from the soil
  • (d)repels all insect pests

  Answer(b) fixes atmospheric nitrogen through its root nodules — the fixed nitrogen enriches the soil the cereal is drawing on.