Voandzeia subterranea

Bambarra groundnut, Congo goober, earth pea, kaffir pea, Madagascar groundnut, stone groundnut

Low short-lived creeping herb with branched stems and hairless trifoliate leaves, native to Africa. The pods are pushed into the soils like those of groundnut, and usually contain only one hard round seed. It grows well in poor soils. The nuts are not used for oil extraction, as they contain only about 6% fat; but are successfully fed to pigs and poultry; the haulms are a valuable cattle feed.

As % of dry matter

DM

CP

CF

Ash

EE

NFE

Ca

P

Ref

Hay, dough stage,

Zimbabwe

90.2

15.9

31.7

7.5

1.8

43.1

499

Pods, Nigeria

96.6

18.2

14.2

5.4

5.5

56.7

374

Seeds, Ghana

92.7

21.3

6.7

3.3

7.5

61.2

0.01

0.30

372

Digestibility (%)

Animal

CP

CF

EE

NFE

ME

Ref

Hay, dough stage

Cattle

65.9

67.1

53.0

70.9

2.40

499

Amino acid composition as % of crude protein

Seed

Ref

372

Arg

Cys

Gly

His

Ils

Leu

Lys

Met

Phe

Thr

Tyr

Val

8.2

0.6

3.8

3.7

4.0

7.6

7.7

0.4

5.4

4.1

-

3.2

4.6