A Novel Approach to Grass-Legume Management

A 2-yr grazing study quantified pasture and animal responses of four forage systems (FS) grazed at two stocking rates (SR; 3 or 6 animals ha-1). Using „Marshall? annual ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum Lam.) and „Durana? white clover (Trifolium repens L.), FS treatments included spatially separated grass and legumes within the same paddock (SS), monoculture grass (MG), monoculture legume (ML), and a binary grass and legume mixture (MIX). Annual herbage mass (HM) was similar among FS at high SR (1900 kg ha-1), but at low SR, grass plots had greater HM (2900 vs. 2000 kg ha-1) than plots of legume monocultures. Animals on SS (1.12 kg) had greater average daily gain (ADG) than ML (0.97 kg), but neither was different from MG (1.08 kg) or MIX (1.00 kg). Low SR animals had greater ADG than high SR (1.09 vs. 0.99 kg). These results indicate that SS grazing system can improve pasture productivity