Annals of Arid Zone-20 (4),241-245, 1981 Changes in forage yield and chemical composi1:ion of range grasses K. C. KANODIA AND P. RAI Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi ABSTRACT Studies were undertaken on 18 cultivars belonging to six grass species under rainfed condition to know the proper time of harvesting of these grasses for their quality forage productbn. Results revealed that most of these grass species and thcir varieties of Cenchrus, Sehima and Chrysopogon having less moihure requirement gave maximum quality forage yield during September, while the highest quality dry matter yield was obtained during October in case of Dichamhium and Bothriochloa varieties with higher moisture regime. The abovt.. months are therefore, recommended as harvesting schedule for the respective grass~s. INTRODUCTION Tropical grasses, unlike their counterparts in the temperate, are low in nutritive value even in their early stages of growth. This value further falls down to 1.5 to 2.0 per cent during their ripe stage. For the bare maintenance of animals in the tropical environment, a minimum of 7.0 per cent crude protein is considered essential (Milford and Minson, 1966). Therefore, studies were undertaken to know the suitable time of harvesting of some of the tropical grasses in order to get the maximum quality forage and to prescribe their suitable cutting schedules. MATERIAL AND METHODS The plots of 8 ill X 3 m size were laid out during June 1973 at Central Research Farm of Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi, in the netural sandy loam soil. In the 3rd week of July, the seeds of 7 cultivars of Cenchrus ciliaris (pusa giant, molopo, buffel, IGFRI, S-59-1, 3108, 3132, 3133), 2 cultivars of Cenchrus setigerus (pusa yellow anjan and Jodhpur local), 6 cultivars of Dichanthium annulatum (Jhansi local, Anand local, S-32, 65, 123 and 128), one cultivar each of Sehima nervosum, Chrysopogon fulvus and Bothriochloa pertusa were sown in line at 50 em spacings. During establishment year, a basal dose of 40 kg Nand 20 kg.p20.,/ha was applied at the time of land preparation and in subsequent years only 40 kg N/ha was applied at the onset of monsoon. After collection of seed, plots were harvested annually during the month of November. The present observations were taken
242 : K. C. KANODIA AND P. RAT during July to December 1976. The general harvesting of all the 1"lotswas carried out during middle of June 1976 and the each plot was divided into six subplots making it into 3 m X 1 m sized quadrats leaving 1 m border on either sides. In the last week of each month (from July to December) one quadrat of each of these grasses was harvested and green forage yield was recorded. One hundred gram samples of each cultivar of each grass were taken and dried into hot air oven at 85 C for 24 hours and weighed for dry matter determination. These samples were utilized for estimation of nitrogen by Microkjeldahl method and percentage of crude protein was calculated by multiplying with factor 6.25. Calcium and phosphorus content in the herbage was determined by oxalate and photocoloric method (Jackson, 1958) respectively. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Dry matter production Dry matter yield obtained during September in the grasses was having lesser moisture such as C. ciliaris c. v. pusa giant anjan (114.9 q/ha), IGFRI, S-59-1 (129.9 q/ha), S-3108 (135.6 q/ha), C. setigerus c. v. pusa yellow anjan (104.8 q/ha), S. nervoslllll (89.1 q/ha), C. fu1vus (116.4 q/ha) and in October in the C. ci1iaris c. v. IGFRI, S-3132 (119.4 q/ha), S-3133 (128.5 q/ha), mo1opo (134.6 q/ha), bufjel (107.4 q/ha), C. setigerus c. v. Jodhpur local (39.4 q/ha), D. annu1atum c. v. Jhansi local (89.5 q/ha), Anand local (100.5 q/ha), S-32 (120.5 q/ha), S-65 (126.0 q/ha), S-123 (114.7 q/ha), S- 128 (108.8 q/ha) and B. pertusa (114.1 q/ha). The minimum dry matter yield was obtained in July in all the grass species. It is quite clear that dry matter yield increases from July to September and in some grass species upto October and after that it shows a declining trend. The decrease in dry matter yield from September-October onwards may be attributed to the shattering of leaves of lower portion of the plants. It clearly reveals that the growth period of these tropical grasses was only 3 to 4 months. The dry forage yield obtained in our earlier studies in the cultivars of C. ciliaris and D. annu1atum (Rai et ai., 1979, 1980) was also more or less similar. The maximum and minimum yields obtained in July was 65.59 q/ha in C. ciliaris c. v. IGFRI, 3108 and 22.3 q/ha in B. pertusa, in August 92.7 q/ha (C. ciliaris c. v. buffel) and 34.3 q/ha in C. setigerus c. v. Jodhpur local, in September 135.6 q/ha (c. ci1iaris 3108) and 38.6 q/ha (c. setigerus c. v. Jodhpur local), in October 134.6 q/ha (c. ci1iaris c. v. molopo) and 39.4 q/ha (c. setigerus c. v. Jodhpur local), in November 110.3 q/ha (D. annulatum c. v. S-65) and 38.4 q/ha (c. setigerus c. v. Jodhpur local) respectively. Dry matter per cent Dry matter per cent increases as the plants get mature. There is a linear increase of dry matter per cent from July to December except in C. ciliaris c. ~. IGFRI, S-3108, molopo, C. setigerus c. v. pusa yellow anjan, D. annu1atum c. v. Jhansi local, S-32 and S. nervosum where the dry matter per cent slightly decreased during December as compared to November.
YIELD AND COMPOSITION OF RANGE GRASSES : 243 The variation In dry matter per cent among different grass species was very wide even during the same month. In July, the minimum dry matter per cent was 23.2 in D. annulatum c. v. S-32 and maximum was 35.0 per cent in S. nervosum. Similarly in August minimum and maximum dry matter percentage was 32.1 (D. annulatum c. v. S- 123) and 42.3 (B. pertusa); in September 36.9 (c. ciliaris c. v. molopo) and 60.8 (S. nervosum); in October 53.2 (c. setigerus c. v. pusa yellow anjan) and 73.0 (B. pertusa); in November 56.9 (C. ciliaris c. v. IGFRI, S-59-l) and 73.5 (B. pertusa) and in December 59.8 (C. ciliaris c. v. IGFRI, S-59-l) and 78.5 per cent (B. pertusa) respectively. Crude protein yield Crude protein content decreased with the age of maturity of the plants in a linear fashion in most of the cases from July to December as also reported by Rekib et al. (1979). The maximum and minimum C.P. content was obtained in July and December harvest respectively in all the grass species. But the variation in c.p. content among all the grasses was very wide in the early stages of growth (July, August) but in the later stages the variation was very narrow. The maximum and minimum C.P. content of 7.44 and 5.47 per cent was recorded with the July harvest in D. al1- nulatum on Anand local and C. fulvlls respectively and 3.47 and 2.27 per cent in D. annulatllm c. v. S-32 and S. nervosum respectively in the last harvest. The C.P. content in Cenchrus species was low as compared to those reported by Mondal and Chakravarty (1968). In case of C. fulvus similar C.P. content was recorded at 60 days cutting interval. However, the C.P. content was found to be in the increasing order with the decreasing interval of cutting with the maximum C.P. content of 10.51 per cent at 10 days cutting interval (Kanodia et al., 1980). Further, on calculating the total C.P. yield it was observed that the maximum crude protein yield was obtained in September harvest from the C. ciliaris c. v. pusa giant anjan, S-59-1, S-3108, buffel, C. setigerus c. v. pusa yellow anjan, D. annulatum c. v. Anand local, S-123, C. fulvus as well as from the October harvest in the C. ciliaris c. v. S-3133, molopo, D. annulatum c. v. Jhansi local, S-32, S-65, S-128 and B. pertusa. However, C. ciliaris c. v. 3132, S. nervosum produced maximum C.P. content in the month of August and C. setigerus c. v. Jodhpur local produced the maximum C.P. yield during the July harvest. Calcium content The percentage of calcium content available in all the grass species did not show any definite trend. However, it is quite clear that percentage of calcium content was slightly higher in July harvest in most of grasses as compared to that of August, September and October. Again herbage of November harvest showed slightly higher calcium content in most of the grasses. However, variation in calcium in the same month of different grasses was 0.32 to 0.78, 0.21 to 0.48, 0.23 to 0.49, 0.32 to 0.61, 0.43 to 0.62 and 0.34 to 0.57 per cent for July, August, September, October, November and December, respectively.
244 : K. C. KANODIA AND p. RAT This type of variation in calcium content in some of the grass species was also reported by Sen and Ray (1971). The maximum calcium production (kgjha) was obtained in the month of November in most of the grass species while minimum production was obtained during July in all the grasses. The reason for lower value of production (kgjha) in these grasses during July is due to the lower values of forage production during this month. Phosphorus content The percentage of phosphorus content in the herbage did not show any definite trend in most of the grass species similar to calcium content. However, all the cultivars of D. annulatum and B. pertusa (grasses of higher moisture regime) have showed that the percentage of phosphorus content was higher in the early stage of growth (July and August) and after that it either decreased or remained constant. The variation in phosphorus content in the same month within the different grasses was recorded from 0.06 to 0.13, 0.07 to 0.19, 0.06 to 0.16, 0.06 to 0.12, 0.05 to 0.18 and 0.05 to 0.10 per cent in July, August, September, October, November and December, respectively. However, the phosphorus content was quite low as compared to those reported by Mondal and Chakravarty (1968) in some of the grasses. Further, it is also seen that the percentage of phosphorus content recorded in C. setigerus c. v. pusa yellow anjan was slightly higher as compared to the most of other grasses. As regards to total phosphorus production (kgjha), it is noted that most of the grass species harvested during October gave highest yield of phosphorus. This might be due to higher forage production during the month. Looking to the maximum. dry forage production and the overall crude protein production of different grasses, it may be concluded that the grasses with a lesser moisture requirement, may be harvested during the month of September and the others during the month of October in order to get the highest quality forage production. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors are highly thankful to Dr. B. D. Patil, Director, Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi, for the facility provided and going through the manuscript. The authors are also thankful to Shri Rajiv Agrawal, Research Fellow for the assistance in the analytical work. REFERENCES Jackson, M. L. 1958. Soil Chemical Analysis. Prentice Hall Inc., New Jersey. Kanodia, K. c., Rai, P., Shankarnarayan, K. A. and Kumar, Ravi, 1980. Response of defoliation management cum manuring on quantity of Chrysopogon fulvus (Spring) Choiv. Indian J. Agric. Sci. (Communicated). Mondal, R. C. and Chakravarty, A. K. 1968. Nutrient content of some perennial pasture grasses of the arid and semi-arid lands of western
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