Overseeding Cool‐Season Annual Legumes and Grasses into Dormant ‘Tifton 85’ Bermudagrass for Forage and Biomass

AbstractAnnual legumes and mixtures of annual legumes and grasses can perform several functions as understory cover crops in pecan orchards, such as providing nitrogenrich organic matter to improve soil fertility, or by sustaining lady beetles and other arthropods that may aid the biological control of pecan pests. Remaining questions concern selection of appropriate plant materials; whether to use cover crops singly or in mixtures; how to ensure reseeding as well as a substantial N contribution; whether, when, and how to use mowing and tillage; and fertilization options. Different considerations apply when dealing with cool- vs. warm-season cover crops. With minor adjustments, growers could adapt present cultural practices to include cool-season cover crops. These could be used throughout the orchard, by establishing appropriate self-reseeding species and avoiding both excessive mowing and indiscriminate placement of N-rich fertilizers. Within alleys, alternating 2-m strips of cool-season cover crops could be tilled in mid to late April or allowed to mature. The tilled strips would supply N to pecan trees immediately, whereas the adjoining untilled (remnant) strips could be mowed after seed is mature, to ensure dispersal of seed and reestablishment of cover crops over the entire alley. Cool-season annual legumes that die or are killed in late spring will probably furnish N and other nutrients at a suitable time, particularly in orchards with sprinkler irrigation. Warm-season cover crops, if desired, should be restricted to alleys to reduce possible competition with pecan. Alleys provide better illumination than do tree rows during periods when pecan trees are in leaf, and the tillage mentioned above will encourage emergence of warm-season cover crops. If these die or are killed in late summer or early fall, timing of N release may not be optimal, in the absence of adequate irrigation. Many options and tradeoffs need to be explored before choosing a cover-crop system. Attimes, several objectives may appear to conflict, and even delicately-managed mixtures of species may not fulfill all the desired functions.

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Screening cool-season legume cover crops for pecan orchards

American Journal of Alternative Agriculture ◽

10.1017/s0889189300005816 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 9 (3) ◽

pp. 127-134 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Michael W. Smith ◽

Raymond D. Eikenbary ◽

Don C. Arnold ◽

B. Scott Landgraf ◽

Glenn G. Taylor ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Cover Crops ◽

Red Clover ◽

Early Spring ◽

Stink Bugs ◽

Cool Season ◽

Crimson Clover ◽

Annual Legumes ◽

Legume Cover Crops ◽

Lady Beetles ◽

Perennial Legumes

AbstractWe evaluated selected cool-season annual and perennial legumes as potential ground covers to supply nitrogen and to increase beneficial arthropod populations in a pecan orchard. Densities of aphids (Homoptera: Aphididae), lady beetles (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae), damsel bug (Hemiptera: Nabidae), green lacewings (Neuroptera: Chrysopidae), brown lacewings (Neuroptera: Hemerobiidae), hover flies (Diptera: Syrphidae), spined soldier bug and other stink bugs (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae), and spiders (Araneida) were monitored at 7–14 day intervals during the growing season for three years. Aboveground biomass production and nitrogen content of the legumes was measured for two years. Aphids peaked during early spring each year, with the highest density usually on ‘Dixie’ crimson clover and ‘Kenland’ red clover. Density of lady beetles was positively correlated with that of aphids, but spider densities were not. Other arthropods usually were not abundant. Nitrogen in the tops of the annual legumes ranged from 20 kg/ha to 89 kg/ha when assessed after a single harvest at anthesis; for the perennial legumes it was from 108 kg/ha to 179 kg/ha following two harvests in June and September. We chose two annual legumes (‘Dixie’ crimson clover and hairy vetch) and two perennial legumes (‘Louisiana S-1’ white clover and ‘Kenland’ red clover) for further evaluation.

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Interseeding Novel Cool‐Season Annual Legumes to Improve Bermudagrass Paddocks

Crop Science ◽

10.2135/cropsci2006.02.0088 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 47 (1) ◽

pp. 168-173 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

S. C. Rao ◽

B. K. Northup ◽

W. A. Phillips ◽

H. S. Mayeux

Keyword(s):

Cool Season ◽

Annual Legumes

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Forage yield and quality from intercropped barley, annual ryegrass and different annual legumes

Grass and Forage Science ◽

10.1046/j.1365-2494.1997.00079.x ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 52 (3) ◽

pp. 298-308 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

D. G. Stout ◽

B. Brooke ◽

J. W. Hall ◽

D. J. Thompson

Keyword(s):

Forage Yield ◽

Annual Ryegrass ◽

Annual Legumes ◽

Yield And Quality

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Forage-Based Heifer Development Program for North Florida

EDIS ◽

10.32473/edis-ag424-2018 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 2018 (5) ◽

Author(s):

Jose C.B. Dubeux ◽

Nicolas DiLorenzo ◽

Kalyn Waters ◽

Jane C. Griffin

Keyword(s):

Development Program ◽

Warm Season ◽

Beef Cows ◽

Good News ◽

Cool Season ◽

Beef Industry ◽

Performance Targets ◽

Grazing Systems ◽

Heifer Development ◽

Reducing Costs

Florida has 915,000 beef cows and 125,000 replacement heifers (USDA, 2016). Developing these heifers so that they can become productive females in the cow herd is a tremendous investment in a cow/calf operation, an investment that takes several years to make a return. The good news is that there are options to develop heifers on forage-based programs with the possibility of reducing costs while simultaneously meeting performance targets required by the beef industry. Mild winters in Florida allows utilization of cool-season forages that can significantly enhance the performance of grazing heifers. During the warm-season, integration of forage legumes into grazing systems will provide additional nutrients to meet the performance required to develop a replacement heifer to become pregnant and enter the mature cow herd. In this document, we will propose a model for replacement heifer development, based on forage research performed in trials at the NFREC Marianna.

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Genetic variation for rate of establishment in caucasian clover

Proceedings of the New Zealand Grassland Association ◽

10.33584/jnzg.1998.60.2282 ◽

1998 ◽

pp. 213-217

Author(s):

K.H. Widdup ◽

T.L. Knight ◽

C.J. Waters

Keyword(s):

Genetic Variation ◽

Root Growth ◽

Seedling Growth ◽

White Clover ◽

Seedling Emergence ◽

Red Clover ◽

Dry Weight ◽

Cool Season ◽

Trifolium Ambiguum ◽

Root Dry Weight

Slow establishment of caucasian clover (Trifolium ambiguum L.) is hindering the use of this legume in pasture mixtures. Improved genetic material is one strategy of correcting the problem. Newly harvested seed of hexaploid caucasian clover germplasm covering a range of origins, together with white and red clover and lucerne, were sown in 1 m rows in a Wakanui soil at Lincoln in November 1995. After 21 days, the caucasian clover material as a group had similar numbers of emerged seedlings as white clover and lucerne, but was inferior to red clover. There was wide variation among caucasian clover lines (48-70% seedling emergence), with the cool-season selection from cv. Monaro ranked the highest. Recurrent selection at low temperatures could be used to select material with improved rates of seedling emergence. Red clover and lucerne seedlings produced significantly greater shoot and root dry weight than caucasian and white clover seedlings. Initially, caucasian clover seedlings partitioned 1:1 shoot to root dry weight compared with 3:1 for white clover. After 2 months, caucasian clover seedlings had similar shoot growth but 3 times the root growth of white clover. Between 2 and 5 months, caucasian clover partitioned more to root and rhizome growth, resulting in a 0.3:1 shoot:root ratio compared with 2:1 for white clover. Both clover species had similar total dry weight after 5 months. Unhindered root/ rhizome devel-opment is very important to hasten the establishment phase of caucasian clover. The caucasian clover lines KZ3 and cool-season, both selections from Monaro, developed seedlings with greater shoot and root growth than cv. Monaro. KZ3 continued to produce greater root growth after 5 months, indicating the genetic potential for improvement in seedling growth rate. Different pasture estab-lishment techniques are proposed that take account of the seedling growth characteristics of caucasian clover. Keywords: establishment, genetic variation, growth, seedling emergence, Trifolium ambiguum

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