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Sustainable management of foxtail meadows through hay making at seed maturity

Huguenin-Elie, O.; Stutz, C.J.; Gago, R. and Lüscher, A. (2008) Sustainable management of foxtail meadows through hay making at seed maturity. Poster at: Cultivating the Future Based on Science: 2nd Conference of the International Society of Organic Agriculture Research ISOFAR, Modena, Italy, June 18-20, 2008.

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Summary

Harvesting meadows at early heading of the grasses yields large quantities of high quality forage but might in the long term cause the swards to deteriorate due to the lack of formation of mature seeds. We studied 4 cutting regimes on a foxtail meadow to define which would maintain the foxtail population naturally and is acceptable in terms of forage quality. The 1st cut of the different cutting regimes was done either at early shooting, shooting, early heading or seed maturity of Alopecurus pratensis L.. The 2nd cut of the 3 first treatments was simultaneous to the 1st cut of the 4th treatment and was ground dried to allow the seeds to fall on the soil. When the meadow was harvested regularly at early heading of A. pratensis, its botanical composition deteriorated within 5 years and its yield decreased. With a 1st cut at seed maturity, A. pratensis produced the most seeds and its proportion in the sward increased, but the forage had the lowest quality. In the treatments with the 1st cut at early shooting or at shooting, A. pratensis produced significant quantities of seeds during the 2nd regrowth, maintained its population and forage of intermediate quality was produced. Sustainable production of quality forage on intensive foxtail meadows might be achieved by periodically having the 1st cut at shooting and using the second regrowth at seed maturity for ground dried hay.


EPrint Type:Conference paper, poster, etc.
Type of presentation:Poster
Keywords:grassland management, meadow foxtail, Alopecurus pratensis, self-reseeding, botanical composition
Subjects: Crop husbandry > Production systems > Pasture and forage crops
Research affiliation: International Conferences > 2008: IFOAM OWC: Research Track / ISOFAR > 2.3 Arable crop production
Deposited By: Huguenin-Elie, Dr Olivier
ID Code:11958
Deposited On:30 Sep 2008
Last Modified:12 Apr 2010 07:36
Document Language:English
Status:Published
Refereed:Peer-reviewed and accepted
Additional Publishing Information:This paper is published in the conference proceedings:
Neuhoff, Daniel; Halberg, Niels; Alfldi, Thomas; Lockeretz, William; Thommen, Andreas; Rasmussen, Ilse A.; Hermansen, John; Vaarst, Mette; Lck, Lorna; Carporali, Fabio; Jensen, Henning Hgh; Migliorini, Paola and Willer, Helga, Eds. (2008) .Cultivating the Future Based on Science. Proceedings of the Second Scientific Conference of the International Society of Organic Agriculture Research (ISOFAR), held at the 16th IFOAM Organic World Congress in Cooperation with the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) and the Consorzio ModenaBio, 18 . 20 June 2008 in Modena, Italy.. International Society of Organic Agriculture Research (ISOFAR), c/o IOL, DE-Bonn, Research Institute of Organic Agriculture FiBL, CH-Frick. http://orgprints.org/13672 and http://orgprints.org/13674

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