Has anyone used fava beans as an “edible” cover crop in cooler tropical areas? I just started playing with it a year ago and found it to produce tremendous amounts of nitrogen. Plus the leaves are tasty and high protein, providing the opportunity for something to eat even using it as a cover crop prior to planting warm season crops. Of course it is used as a food crop many places but I’m thinking about it as a dual purpose cover/food source that can be cut down at flowering time to provide Nitrogen fertilizer for the following crop.
Greetings David,
I’m experimenting with it after reading about it in Roland Bunch’s book. However, something to keep in mind before sharing it around is that people with G6PD deficiency (which can be a significant number of some ethnic populations) can develop a serious and sometimes fatal hemolytic anemia from eating fava beans. For example, in Haiti where I live, supposedly about 25% of the (mostly black, African-decent) population has some degree of G6PD deficiency.
Joel
1 Like