Black Pepper
Black Pepper
English name: Pepper
Scientific name: Piper nigrum
Taxonomic Position According to Cronquist (1981)
Division: Megnoliophyta
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Piperals
Family: Piperaceae
Genus: Piper
Species: P. nigrum
Botanical Description of Pepper
Habit: Piper nigrum is a perennial glabrous woody climber to 10 m or more in height
Root: The pepper plant has 10-20 main adventitious roots from the base of the mature stem which penetrate to a depth of 1-2 m and there is an extensive mass of surface feeding roots.
Stem: The branches are dimorphic. The orthotropic vegetative climbing branches give the framework of the plant; they become stout, 4-6 cm in diameter at the base, and woody with a thick flake- like bark; the internodes are 5-12 cm long.
Leaves: The leaves are alternate and simple, with a petiole 2-5 cm long. which is grooved above. Two lateral stipules sheath the petiole, which turn back and fall early. The lamina is ovate, entire and coriaceous, with the base oblique, obtuse or rounded and the tip acuminate.
Flowers: The pendant spikes are borne opposite the leaves on the plagiotropic branches and are 3-15 cm long, bearing 50-150 minute flowers borne in the axils of ovate fleshy bracts. The flowers may be unisexual or bisexual with monoecious or dioecious forms or hermaphrodite as occurs in many cultivars. The flowers have no perianth and 2-4 minute stamens are borne on each side of the ovary in hermaphrodite flowers and are 1 mm long with small anthers with two sacs. The ovary is globose, one-celled, one-ovuled, surmounted by 3-5 rather fleshy stigma.
Fruits: The fruit is a sessile, globose drupe, 4-6 mm in diameter, with a pulpy pericarp, borne in spike 5-15 cm long. Each spike may produce 50-60 single- seeded fruits. The unripe fruit is green with the exocarp turning red when ripe, and drying black .
Table 1. Pepper variety released by SRC, BARI, Gazipur, Bangladesh
Sl. No. | Name of Variety | Released by | Yield |
1 | Jainthia Golmorich | SRC, BARI | 1.25-1.5 ton/ha |