New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research abstracts
Forage production and quality of serradella in mild winter areas in north-west
Spain
I. IGLESIAS*
J. LLOVERAS+
Investigaciones Agrarias de Mabegondo
Apartado 10
15080, La Coruña, Spain
Present address:
*Escuela Politécnica Superior, Campus Universitario, 27002 Lugo,
Spain.
+UdL-IRTA, Av Rovira Roure 177, 25198 Lleida, Spain.
Abstract Forage production potential and nutritive value of
pink serradella (Ornithopus sativus) from New Zealand and from the
Atlantic coastal areas of Galicia (north-west Spain, south-west Europe) were
compared. The experiments were conducted in the high rainfall and mild winter
areas of Galicia, where this minor legume has traditionally been grown on
neutral to acidic sandy soils for hay and for green fodder production. The
average forage dry matter (DM) yields ranged from 4.2 to 4.3 t DM
ha-1 in April and 5.6 to 6.1 t DM ha-1 in May. At the May
harvest the accumulated growing degree day units (base 10) ranged from 448 to
497. `Grasslands Koha', a New Zealand variety of European origin, was the
highest yielder, suggesting that serradella plant material from south-west
Europe may be adapted to some areas of New Zealand and vice-versa. The average
decline in the forage quality of serradella from the vegetative stage to
flowering stage was 0.71 g kg-1 d-1 in crude protein and
1.42 g kg-1 d-1 in in vitro organic matter
digestibility. These quality reductions are lower than the values reported for
some other forage crops. This important feature could be used to maximise
production of high quality spring forage.
Keywords Ornithopus sativus; forage quality; growth
stage; harvest date; serradella cultivars
New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research, 2000, Vol. 43: 35-40
0028-8233/00/4301-0035 $7.00/0 (c) The Royal Society of New Zealand
2000
PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (463K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)
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