Cicer arietinum Seeds | Chickpeas
LATIN NAME: Cicer arietinum
COMMON NAME: Chickpea
Plant Profile
The pod is short, inflated and covered in long glandular hairs that exude malic and oxalic acid, a sticky layer that gums up small insects and discourages chewing. Each pod usually holds one or two seeds, occasionally three. The plant is an upright annual with a deep taproot and, when water is short, an extensive secondary root system that can reach well below the plough layer.
Kabuli types have large pale seeds with a smooth, thin coat; desi types are smaller, angular and coloured, with a thicker coat and a higher fibre content. The two groups differ in more than appearance. Desi types generally flower earlier and tolerate heat and drought better, while kabuli types dominate the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern trade.
The pinnate leaf carries eleven to fifteen small, toothed leaflets and a terminal leaflet, giving the plant its fine, ferny look. The papilionaceous flower is white in most kabuli lines and pink to violet in many desi lines, and its keel encloses the stamens so tightly that the flower sets seed before it opens. Cross-pollination is rare, which is why seed companies can hold a line true for decades.
When a chickpea runs short of phosphorus or iron, its roots release malic acid, citric acid and oxalic acid into the surrounding soil. The acids acidify a thin film around the root and free phosphate bound to calcium, a trick that matters enormously on the alkaline soils of the Mediterranean and the Deccan, where other legumes simply stall.
The chickpea nodulates with a specific set of rhizobia, chiefly Mesorhizobium ciceri and its relatives, which are not the same bacteria that nodulate pea or bean. Seed treated with the wrong inoculant will grow perfectly well and fix almost nothing, so match the inoculant to the crop name on the packet.
Science & Biotechnology
The seed contains the isoflavones biochanin A and formononetin, plus saponins and raffinose-family oligosaccharides. The oligosaccharides are the reason chickpeas are rinsed and soaked before cooking: they pass undigested to the colon, where bacteria ferment them and produce gas.
The chickpea genome was sequenced from a desi line, and breeders now screen wild Cicer species for resistance to Ascochyta blight and pod borer. Seed banks in India, Syria and Australia hold the bulk of that diversity, and it is one of the better-conserved legume collections in the world.
Uses & Benefits
The two seed types cook differently. Kabuli chickpeas soften into a creamy paste with a smooth skin and are the natural choice for hummus, where the seed is blended with tahini, lemon and garlic. Desi chickpeas hold their shape better and are split into the yellow halves sold as chana dal for spiced stews and ground as besan flour for fritters and sweets.
Cooking chickpeas in the soaking water produces a firmer, more savoury seed, while discarding it gives a milder flavour. Save the water from a plain boil: it whips into the foamy liquid known as aquafaba, long used as an egg white substitute in meringues and mousses.
Growing from Seed
Chickpea resents waterlogging more than almost any other legume, so sow on a raised ridge or a sandy loam that drains freely. Work the seed into a firm, fine tilth about 5 cm deep and 10 cm apart in the row, with rows 45 to 60 cm apart so air moves through the canopy. Water sparingly until flowering, then keep the soil evenly moist as the pods fill.
Coat the seed with chickpea-specific inoculant just before sowing and keep it out of direct sun while you work. Never sow into a bed that grew chickpea, or any pulse, in the previous season: the soil-borne Ascochyta fungus survives on residue and causes the dark lesions that can collapse a whole crop.
In warm regions the main pest is the pod borer caterpillar, which tunnels into the developing pod. A stretch of flowering that finishes before the moth population peaks avoids the worst of it, and interplanting with a tall, aromatic crop such as coriander masks the plants from the egg-laying females.
Our Take
Chickpea is the one pulse I always grow on a ridge, never in a flat bed, and I keep the run short so I can rotate it properly. If you want to explore the genus, try the very early Cicer songaricum for hot, dry ground, or the tiny-leaved alpine Cicer microphyllum if you garden cold and high. For a warm summer pulse the productive pigeon pea makes a good companion in the same rotation slot.
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