Interest of multi-species swards for pasture-based milk production systems
- Roca-Fernández A.I. 1
- Peyraud J.L. 1
- Delaby L. 1
- Lassalas J. 1
- Delagarde R 1
- 1 INRA-Agrocampus Ouest, UMR1348 PEGASE, F-35590 Saint-Gilles, France
Verlag: European Grassland Federation
ISBN: 978-0-9926940-1-2
Datum der Publikation: 2014
Seiten: 728-730
Art: Buch-Kapitel
Zusammenfassung
The objective of this 2-year study was to determine the potential of multi-species swards (MSS)for making secure forage availability in grazing dairy systems, and for increasing milkproduction on a per-ha basis. Four types of sward with increasing number of sward species(from pure perennial ryegrass to a mixture of five species including perennial ryegrass, twoclovers, chicory and tall fescue) were compared with four block replicates. Treatments withinblocks were simultaneously grazed by four homogeneous dairy herds at the same pastureallowance. Total grazing days per season or per year were unaffected by treatment, but milkoutput per ha was greater for grass-legume mixtures and MSS compared to pure perennialryegrass swards. This was related to greater milk production per cow and per day. It isconcluded that, under favourable weather conditions particularly in late spring and earlysummer, advantages of MSS on milk output on a per-ha basis are mainly due to an improvedper-cow production rather than to increased pasture herbage production and grazing days/ ha