''Vicia sativa'', known as the common vetch, garden vetch, tare or simply vetch, is a

nitrogen-fixing Nitrogen fixation is a chemical process by which molecular nitrogen (), with a strong triple covalent bond, in the air is converted into ammonia () or related nitrogenous compounds, typically in soil or aquatic systems but also in industry. Atmos ...

leguminous A legume () is a plant in the family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seed of such a plant. When used as a dry grain, the seed is also called a pulse. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consumption, for livestock for ...

plant in the family

Fabaceae The Fabaceae or Leguminosae,International Code of Nomenc ...

. It is likely native to North Africa, Western Asia and Europe, but is now naturalized in temperate and subtropical regions worldwide. Although considered a

weed A weed is a plant considered undesirable in a particular situation, "a plant in the wrong place", or a plant growing where it is not wanted.Harlan, J. R., & deWet, J. M. (1965). Some thoughts about weeds. ''Economic botany'', ''19''(1), 16-24. ...

when found growing in a cultivated grainfield, this hardy plant is often grown as a

green manure In agriculture, a green manure is a crop specifically produced to be incorporated into the soil while still green. Typically, the green manure's biomass is incorporated with a plow or disk, as is often done with (brown) manure. The primary goal ...

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...

fodder Fodder (), also called provender (), is any agriculture, agricultural foodstuff used specifically to feed domesticated livestock, such as cattle, domestic rabbit, rabbits, sheep, horses, chickens and pigs. "Fodder" refers particularly to food g ...

or rotation crop. More than per year of ''Vicia sativa'' is grown in

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Description

''Vicia sativa'' is a sprawling annual herb, with hollow, four-sided, hairless to sparsely hairy stems which can reach two meters in maximum length. The leaves are stipulate, alternate and compound, each made up of 3–8 opposite pairs of linear, lance-shaped, oblong, or wedge-shaped, needle-tipped leaflets up to long. Each

compound leaf A leaf ( : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, st ...

ends in a branched

tendril In botany, a tendril is a specialized stem, leaf or petiole with a threadlike shape used by climbing plants for support and attachment, as well as cellular invasion by parasitic plants such as ''Cuscuta''. There are many plants that have tendr ...

. The pea-like flowers occur in the leaf axils, solitary or in pairs. The flower corolla is long and bright pink-purple in colour, more rarely whitish or yellow. The flowers are mostly visited by

bumblebee A bumblebee (or bumble bee, bumble-bee, or humble-bee) is any of over 250 species in the genus ''Bombus'', part of Apidae, one of the bee families. This genus is the only extant group in the tribe Bombini, though a few extinct related gener ...

s. The fruit is a

legume A legume () is a plant in the family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seed of such a plant. When used as a dry grain, the seed is also called a pulse. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consumption, for livestock f ...

pod up to long, which is hairy when new, smooth later, then brown or black when ripe. It contains 4–12 seeds. (MHNT) Vicia sativa - flower.jpg, Common flower. (MHNT) Vicia sativa - white flower.jpg, Rarer white flower (MHNT) Vicia sativa - immature fruit.jpg, Immature fruit

Cultivation

Sown for

, the

seed A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiospe ...

sown Sowing is the process of planting seeds. An area or object that has had seeds planted in it will be described as a sowed or sown area. Plants which are usually sown Among the major field crops, oats, wheat, and rye are sown, grasses and le ...

densely, up to . However, when grown for seed, less seed should be used; otherwise the crop will be too thick, reducing flower and seed production. When meant for seed, sowing is done early in the planting season for good returns; but, when for green manure, any time in spring is suitable. Sometimes, a full crop can be obtained even when sown as late as summer, though sowing so late is not recommended. After the seed is sown and the land carefully harrowed, a light

roller Roller may refer to: Birds *Roller, a bird of the family Coraciidae * Roller (pigeon), a domesticated breed or variety of pigeon Devices * Roller (agricultural tool), a non-powered tool for flattening ground * Road roller, a vehicle for compa ...

ought to be drawn across, to smooth the surface and permit the

scythe A scythe ( ) is an agricultural hand tool for mowing grass or harvesting crops. It is historically used to cut down or reap edible grains, before the process of threshing. The scythe has been largely replaced by horse-drawn and then tractor m ...

to work without interruption. Also, the field should be watched for several days to prevent

pigeon Columbidae () is a bird family consisting of doves and pigeons. It is the only family in the order Columbiformes. These are stout-bodied birds with short necks and short slender bills that in some species feature fleshy ceres. They primarily ...

s from eating too much of the sown seed.

Horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...

s thrive very well on common vetch, even better than on

clover Clover or trefoil are common names for plants of the genus ''Trifolium'' (from Latin ''tres'' 'three' + ''folium'' 'leaf'), consisting of about 300 species of flowering plants in the legume or pea family Fabaceae originating in Europe. The genus ...

and

rye grass ''Lolium'' is a genus of tufted grasses in the bluegrass subfamily (Pooideae). It is often called ryegrass, but this term is sometimes used to refer to grasses in other genera. They are characterized by bunch-like growth habits. ''Lolium'' is ...

; the same applies to fattening

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult mal ...

, which feed faster on vetch than on most

grasses Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns and ...

or other edible plants. Danger often arises from livestock eating too much vetch, especially when podded;

colic Colic or cholic () is a form of pain that starts and stops abruptly. It occurs due to muscular contractions of a hollow tube ( small and large intestine, gall bladder, ureter, etc.) in an attempt to relieve an obstruction by forcing content out ...

s and other

stomach The stomach is a muscular, hollow organ in the gastrointestinal tract of humans and many other animals, including several invertebrates. The stomach has a dilated structure and functions as a vital organ in the digestive system. The stomach i ...

disorders are apt to be produced by the excessive amounts devoured.

Cereal A cereal is any Poaceae, grass cultivated for the edible components of its grain (botanically, a type of fruit called a caryopsis), composed of the endosperm, Cereal germ, germ, and bran. Cereal Grain, grain crops are grown in greater quantit ...

grains can be sown with vetch so it can use their stronger stems for support, attaching via

s. When grown with

oat The oat (''Avena sativa''), sometimes called the common oat, is a species of cereal grain grown for its seed, which is known by the same name (usually in the plural, unlike other cereals and pseudocereals). While oats are suitable for human con ...

s or other

grass Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns an ...

es, the vetch can grow upright; otherwise its weak stems may sprawl along the ground.FAO Crop Profile
/ref> Several

cultivar A cultivar is a type of cultivated plant that people have selected for desired traits and when propagated retain those traits. Methods used to propagate cultivars include: division, root and stem cuttings, offsets, grafting, tissue culture, ...

s are available for agricultural use, and as for some other legume crops,

rhizobia Rhizobia are diazotrophic bacteria that fix nitrogen after becoming established inside the root nodules of legumes (Fabaceae). To express genes for nitrogen fixation, rhizobia require a plant host; they cannot independently fix nitrogen. In gene ...

can be added to the seed. Pests that attack this crop include the

powdery mildew Powdery mildew is a fungal disease that affects a wide range of plants. Powdery mildew diseases are caused by many different species of ascomycete fungi in the order Erysiphales. Powdery mildew is one of the easier plant diseases to identify, as ...

fungus ''

Erysiphe pisi ''Erysiphe pisi'' is a plant pathogen that causes powdery mildew on several plant species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is ofte ...

'', the pea aphid ''

Acyrthosiphon pisum ''Acyrthosiphon pisum'', commonly known as the pea aphid (and colloquially known as the green dolphin, pea louse, and clover louse), is a sap-sucking insect in the family Aphididae. It feeds on several species of legumes (plant family Fabaceae) ...

'', the corn earworm (''Heliothis zea''), the

fall armyworm The fall armyworm (''Spodoptera frugiperda'') is a species in the order Lepidoptera and one of the species of the fall armyworm moths distinguished by their larval life stage. The term "armyworm" can refer to several species, often describing th ...

(''Spodoptera frugiperda''), and

spider mite Spider mites are members of the Tetranychidae family, which includes about 1,200 species. They are part of the subclass Acari (mites). Spider mites generally live on the undersides of leaves of plants, where they may spin protective silk webs, a ...

s of genus ''

Tetranychus ''Tetranychus'' is a genus of spider mite. ''Tetranychus'' is one of the most economically important genera of mites, due to its high potential to destroy agriculture. It contains over 140 species, the most significant of which is ''Tetranychus ...

''. During the early 20th century, a mutant of the common vetch arose with lens-shaped seeds resembling those of the

lentil The lentil (''Lens culinaris'' or ''Lens esculenta'') is an edible legume. It is an annual plant known for its lens-shaped seeds. It is about tall, and the seeds grow in pods, usually with two seeds in each. As a food crop, the largest pro ...

, leading to vetch invasions of lentil fields. D. G. Rowlands showed in 1959 that this was due to a single

recessive In genetics, dominance is the phenomenon of one variant (allele) of a gene on a chromosome masking or overriding the effect of a different variant of the same gene on the other copy of the chromosome. The first variant is termed dominant and t ...

mutation. The transition from traditional

winnowing Winnowing is a process by which chaff is separated from grain. It can also be used to remove pests from stored grain. Winnowing usually follows threshing in grain preparation. In its simplest form, it involves throwing the mixture into the ...

mechanised farming Mechanised agriculture or agricultural mechanization is the use of machinery and equipment, ranging from simple and basic hand tools to more sophisticated, motorized equipment and machinery, to perform agricultural operations. In modern times, po ...

practices largely solved this problem. Improved varieties of ''Vicia sativa'' developed by the National Vetch Breeding Program for

Australian farmers Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

include; Timok, Volga, Rasina and more recently Studenica. These varieties are mostly cultivated in Western Australia, South Australia and Victoria. More than per year of ''Vicia sativa'' was grown in

in 2019.

History

Common vetch has long been part of the human diet, as attested by carbonised remains found at early

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...

sites in Syria, Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary and Slovakia. It has also been reported from

Predynastic Prehistoric Egypt and Predynastic Egypt span the period from the earliest human settlement to the beginning of the Early Dynastic Period around 3100 BC, starting with the first Pharaoh, Narmer for some Egyptologists, Hor-Aha for others, with ...

sites of ancient Egypt, and several Bronze Age sites in Turkmenia and Slovakia. However, definite evidence for later vetch cultivation is available only for

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

times. The "tare" referred to in some English translations of the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

(as in the "

Parable of the Tares The Parable of the Tares or Weeds (KJV: ''tares'', Weymouth New Testament, WNT: ''darnel'', Douay–Rheims Bible, DRB: ''cockle'') is a parables of Jesus, parable of Jesus which appears in . The parable relates how servants eager to pull up weeds ...

") may be darnel ryegrass, ''

Lolium temulentum ''Lolium temulentum'', typically known as darnel, poison darnel, darnel ryegrass or cockle, is an annual plant of the genus '' Lolium'' within the family Poaceae. The plant stem can grow up to one meter tall, with inflorescence in the ears and p ...

''.

Taxonomy

''Vicia sativa'' was first described by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

in his 1753 ''

Species Plantarum ' (Latin for "The Species of Plants") is a book by Carl Linnaeus, originally published in 1753, which lists every species of plant known at the time, classified into genera. It is the first work to consistently apply binomial names and was the ...

''. Since that time, a number of

synonyms A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

have published: *''Vicia abyssinica'' Alef. *''Vicia alba'' Moench *''Vicia amphicarpa'' Dorthes *''Vicia amphicarpa'' L. *''Vicia angustifolia'' L. *''Vicia angustifolia'' Reichard *''Vicia bacla'' Moench *''Vicia bobartii'' E. Forster *''Vicia bobartii'' E.Forst. *''Vicia bobartii'' Koch *''Vicia canadensis'' Zuccagni *''Vicia communis'' Rouy *''Vicia consobrina'' Pomel *''Vicia cordata'' Hoppe *''Vicia cornigera'' Chaub. *''Vicia cornigera'' St.-Amans *''Vicia cosentini'' Guss. *''Vicia cuneata'' Gren. & Godr. *''Vicia cuneata'' Guss. *''Vicia debilis'' Perez Lara *''Vicia erythosperma'' Rchb. *''Vicia glabra'' Schleich. *''Vicia globosa'' Retz. *''Vicia heterophylla'' C.Presl *''Vicia incisa'' M.Bieb. *''Vicia incisaeformis'' Stef. *''Vicia intermedia'' Viv. *''Vicia lanciformis'' Lange *''Vicia lentisperma'' auctor ign. *''Vicia leucosperma'' Moench *''Vicia macrocarpa'' Bertol. *''Vicia maculata'' C.Presl *''Vicia maculata'' Rouy *''Vicia melanosperma'' Rchb. *''Vicia morisiana'' Boreau *''Vicia nemoralis'' Boreau *''Vicia nemoralis'' Ten. *''Vicia notota'' Gilib. *''Vicia pallida'' Baker *''Vicia pilosa'' M.Bieb. *''Vicia pimpinelloides'' Mauri *''Vicia segetalis'' Thuill. *''Vicia subterranea'' Dorthes *''Vicia terana'' Losa *''Vicia vulgaris'' Uspensky There are at least four generally accepted

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

: * ''Vicia sativa'' subsp. ''cordata'' (Hoppe) Asch. & Graebn. * ''Vicia sativa'' subsp. ''nigra'' (L.) Ehrh. – narrow-leaved vetch (= subsp. / var. ''angustifolia'', subsp. ''consobrina'', subsp. ''cordata'' (Hoppe) Batt., subsp. ''cuneata'', subsp. ''heterophylla'', var. ''minor'', var. ''nigra'') * ''Vicia sativa'' subsp. ''sativa'' (= var. ''linearis'', ssp. ''notata'') * ''Vicia sativa'' subsp. ''segetalis'' (Thuill.) Arcang. (sometimes included in subsp. ''nigra'')

Genome

The ''Vicia sativa''

karyotype A karyotype is the general appearance of the complete set of metaphase chromosomes in the cells of a species or in an individual organism, mainly including their sizes, numbers, and shapes. Karyotyping is the process by which a karyotype is disce ...

consists of 5, 6 or 7

chromosome A chromosome is a long DNA molecule with part or all of the genetic material of an organism. In most chromosomes the very long thin DNA fibers are coated with packaging proteins; in eukaryotic cells the most important of these proteins are ...

s, with six (n=6) being the most common and best described. Given the ''Vicia sativa's'' genome is relatively large genome size (1.75 Gb) due to large amounts of repetitive DNA, sequencing the genome was challenging compared to other legumes such as ''

Medicago truncatula ''Medicago truncatula'', the barrelclover, strong-spined medick, barrel medic, or barrel medick, is a small annual legume native to the Mediterranean region that is used in genomic research. It is a low-growing, clover-like plant tall with trifol ...

'' or

soybean The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean, which has numerous uses. Traditional unfermented food uses of soybeans include soy milk, from which tofu an ...

s. A high-quality chromosome level genome assembly was published in 2021 of variety Studencia (n=6), following a draft genome assembly of line KSR5 (n=7). Variety Studencia, is predicted to have 53,318 protein coding genes. Whole genome sequence comparisons showed that ''Vicia sativa'' is most closely related to

pea The pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the flowering plant species ''Pisum sativum''. Each pod contains several peas, which can be green or yellow. Botanically, pea pods are fruit, since they contain seeds and d ...

. A high-quality genome sequence facilitates the application of

genome editing Genome editing, or genome engineering, or gene editing, is a type of genetic engineering in which DNA is inserted, deleted, modified or replaced in the genome of a living organism. Unlike early genetic engineering techniques that randomly inserts ...

and genomic selection for healthy, higher yielding varieties.

References

External links

Jepson Manual TreatmentUSDA Plants Profile
*
Washington Burke MuseumPhoto gallery
{{Taxonbar, from=Q157071

sativa Sativa, sativus, and sativum are Latin botanical adjectives meaning '' cultivated''. It is often associated botanically with plants that promote good health and used to designate certain seed-grown domestic crops. Usage ''Sativa'' (ending in -a) ...

Flora of Europe Flora of Estonia Flora of the United Kingdom Nitrogen-fixing crops Plants described in 1753 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus