Useful Plants at the Farm - Gliricidia Sepium
Feb 27, 2009
This is a plant from Central America, now endemic in Malaysia. It is an inconspicuous and not particularly pretty small tree. You will see it by the road side growing wild. It is known as 'pokok pagar' locally. In our farm, it serves multiple functions.
As a shade tree and windbreak
It is extremely fast growing and takes root even in poor soil. It is an excellent fixer of atmospheric nitrogen and before too long, the soil where it is planted can be used to plant more nitrogen demanding plants.
Because of its fast growth, we plant it everywhere in the farm as a carbon seqeuster to reduce our carbon footprint arising from the carbon dioxide and methane emissions from the animals.
Here it is as a living fence. It will never rot, all we need do is to trim it, and it performs as a post while sequestering carbon. Isn't nature wonderful?
The leaves make an excellent insect repellant and it can be used as fodder for goats due to its high protein content. However, because of its high tannin content it is not suited for other ruminants and chickens.
The leaves can also be used to quicken the ripening of bananas and papayas.
The wood can be used as fuel wood and also to convert to biochar.
The tree produces pretty pink flowers which can also be used as an insect repellent. 
Maybe because of the pretty flowers you can sometimes find them lining certain streets.
But during the flowering season, pity the poor road sweeper.
2 comments
I never of heard such a plant before. But after reading your post I understood all the benefits of this useful farm plant. I think even I must plant it in my farm as you said that it fixes more nitrogen so that the soil fertility increases further. Thanks for posting about this useful plant.
Hi,
1.Crush the bark and ferment with some cooked grains, and it can be used to kill rats.
2. It's leaf have a protein content of 20%, excellent protein source for goats
3. Alley cropped at 4 meters, it allows for continous cropping of food plants (rotated)
Good luck
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