Published in Scientific Papers. Series A. Agronomy, Vol. LIX
Written by Altıngül Özaslan PARLAK, Ahmet GÖKKUŞ, Fırat ALATÜRK, Hülya HANOĞLU, Cemil TÖLÜ
Summers are hot and dry and winters are cool and precipitated in regions with dominant Mediterranean climate. Since the pastures totally dry out during hot-dry period, sheep usually graze over wheat stubble in Turkey. The present study was conducted to investigate the herbage yield and quality of wheat stubble and Sorghum Sudan-grass pastures during summer dry periods and to compare live weight gains of the sheep grazed over these pastures. In sorghum Sudan-grass pastures, sheep (4 Karacabey merino race sheep x 3 replications) freely grazed in each plot for two-and-a half month (July-August-September) when the plants had 50-75 cm heights. Similar grazing treatments were also performed over wheat stubble. Dry herbage yields of wheat stubble and sorghum sudan-grass pastures were respectively observed as 2.82 ton/ha and 10.0 ton/ha. Considering the herbage quality of the wheat stubble, crude protein was 6.28 %; NDF was 66.54%. ADF was 37.88%, ADL was 4.37%, DMD was 60.25%, ME was 2.18 Kcal/kgKM. The same values were respectively observed as 11.33%, 61.13%, 31.58%, 2.99%, 67.27%, 2.43% in sorghum sudan-grass pasture.Traditional sheep grazing can be performed over wheat stubble pastures, but supplementary energy feed with CP should be provided. Sorghum sudan-grass can also be cultivated as an alternative to traditional stubble grazing. In this case, there is no need for supplementary feeds.
[Read full article] [Citation]
