Effects of herbicide application to control sward composition in different management variants

Petersen, Ute; Wrage‐Mönnig, Nicole; Isselstein, J.

doi:10.1080/21513732.2012.760488

Cited by 6 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…As part of normal agricultural practice, many farmers use herbicides to remove species regarded as weeds, or of low value, in order to extend the life of a sown sward and improve production of grasses and overall forage quality (Fuhlendorf et al, 2009;Petersen et al, 2013). However, Petersen et al (2013) did not detect any consistent effect of herbicide application on the herbage yield in an experiment on cut grassland that had vegetation similar to the swards of the present study. Seither et al (2012) also found no effects of sward manipulation on primary productivity in the initial years of the present study.…”

Section: Effects Of Sward Type and Phytodiversity On Productivitycontrasting

confidence: 71%

“…On permanent grassland the range of species is typically much larger, which was also the case for the swards of the present study. Consequently, even species-poor grassland ecosystems can show a certain level of complementary resource use (Wrage et al, 2011;Petersen et al, 2013), and this may also explain the absence of a relationship between species richness and productivity in the present study.…”

Section: Effects Of Sward Type and Phytodiversity On Productivitymentioning

confidence: 64%

“…Spectra were evaluated with a calibration dataset of samples from different grasslands in Germany (Tillmann, 2010). Mean H-values (Mahalanobis distances) of 1.79 ± 0.68 indicated a sufficient coverage by the calibration set, and data with H-values above 3.0 were removed from the analysis (Petersen et al, 2013). The standard errors of calibration of CP, ADF, and CL were 0.69, 1.19, and 0.28, respectively.…”

Section: Sward Measurements and Forage Qualitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, attention needs to be focused on other grassland management options to enable the integration of production with biodiversity objectives in agricultural systems (Isselstein et al, 2005). There is an on-going debate on how plant diversity can affect ecosystem services, including grassland productivity, under varying conditions (e.g., Hector et al, 2010;Wrage et al, 2011;Seither et al, 2012;Petersen et al, 2013;Isbell et al, 2015;Carlsson et al, 2017). Many experiments on sown grasslands have indicated positive relationships with species richness (e.g., Hector et al, 1999;Bullock et al, 2001;Tilman et al, 2001) or evenness (Kirwan et al, 2007) on herbage dry matter (DM) yield as measured under cutting.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Phytodiversity has also been shown to affect forage quality, although reports are inconsistent (Bullock et al, 2001;Tracy and Faulkner, 2006). For example, White et al (2004) found a negative effect, while other studies (Hofmann and Isselstein, 2005;Isselstein, 2005;Seip et al, 2012;Petersen et al, 2013) have suggested that the herbage of more diverse-swards contains higher concentrations of crude protein, particularly in late season.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Diverse Swards and Mixed-Grazing of Cattle and Sheep for Improved Productivity

Jerrentrup¹,

Komainda²,

Seither³

et al. 2020

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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Increasing sward phytodiversity has been suggested as having potential to increase primary production of grasslands, but whether any such gains are converted into secondary production, through improved performance of grazing livestock, remains uncertain. Animal production by cattle and sheep can also be enhanced by mixed-grazing. To our knowledge, this effect has never been studied in relation to differences in sward phytodiversity. Therefore, a rotational grazing experiment was conducted over 5 years (2007-2011) on permanent grassland in Germany using sheep and cattle in mono-(single-species) or mixed-grazing of swards differing in plant species richness. Herbicides against dicotyledonous plant species were used to create different sward types: species-poor, grass-dominated swards in contrast to untreated "diverse" control swards. We found no differences in herbage production between the sward types. However, compared to the grass-dominated sward, the diverse sward showed greater concentrations of crude protein and lower contents of acid detergent fiber in the herbage dry-matter. Lamb live weight gains were slightly greater on the diverse-swards (P < 0.05), but calf performance was unaffected by sward type. Mixed-grazing increased daily average live weight gains of suckler cows (g cow −1 d −1) (P < 0.05) as well as area-related daily live weight gains (kg ha −1 d −1) and total live weight gains (kg ha −1) during the complete grazing season (P < 0.001). This indicates advantages of combining livestock species, attributed to complementary pasture use. We suggest that mixed-grazing of cattle and sheep on phytodiverse swards is an effective and sustainable means to enhance ecological and agronomic traits such as livestock production and plant species conservation. Lamb production especially showed benefits under mixed-grazing, with a 17% increase in live weight gain. Compared to the grass-dominated sward, diverse swards resulted in an average 12% increase of live weight gains (across grazing systems and livestock species).

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Section: Effects Of Sward Type and Phytodiversity On Productivitycontrasting

confidence: 71%

Section: Effects Of Sward Type and Phytodiversity On Productivitymentioning

confidence: 64%

Section: Sward Measurements and Forage Qualitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Diverse Swards and Mixed-Grazing of Cattle and Sheep for Improved Productivity

Jerrentrup¹,

Komainda²,

Seither³

et al. 2020

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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Fertilizer addition lessens the flux of microbial carbon to higher trophic levels in soil food webs of grassland

Lemanski

Scheu

2014

Oecologia

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Roots and root-derived C compounds are increasingly recognised as important resources for soil animal food webs. We used (13)C-labelled glucose as a model C compound representing root exudates to follow the incorporation of root-derived C into the soil animal food web of a temperate grassland over a period of 52 weeks. We investigated variations in glucose C incorporation with fertilizer addition and sward composition, i.e. variations in plant functional groups. The approach allowed the differentiation of trophic chains based on primary decomposers feeding on litter and phytophagous species feeding on roots (i.e. not incorporating glucose C) from those based on secondary decomposers feeding on microorganisms (thereby assimilating glucose C). Each of the studied soil animal species incorporated glucose C, indicating that the majority of grassland soil animal species rely on microorganisms as food resources with microorganisms being fuelled by root exudates. However, incorporation of glucose C into soil animal species varied markedly with species identity, suggesting that detritivorous microarthropods complement each other in channelling microbial C through soil food webs. Fertilizer addition markedly reduced the concentration of glucose C in most soil animal species as well as the absolute transfer of glucose C into oribatid mites as major secondary decomposers. The results suggest that fertilizer addition shifts the basis of the decomposer food web towards the use of unlabelled resources, presumably roots, i.e. towards a herbivore system, thereby lessening the link between microorganisms and microbial grazers and hampering the propagation of microbial C to higher trophic levels.

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Nitrogen addition and harvest frequency rather than initial plant species composition determine vertical structure and light interception in grasslands

Petersen

Isselstein

2015

AoB PLANTS

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Recent biodiversity experiments using sown plant communities suggest a positive effect of plant species diversity on ecosystem functioning and resource use. However, are these experimental results applicable to agriculturally managed grassland? We analysed vegetation structure and light interception in managed grassland in which species composition had been manipulated by herbicides. We expected the functionally more diverse plots (grasses and forbs in equal amounts) to better intercept the light than plots containing more than 90% grasses due to an optimal arrangement of leaves in space. However, management (fertilization and mowing regime) had a much stronger influence on structure and light interception than plant species composition.

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Effects of herbicide application to control sward composition in different management variants

Cited by 6 publications

References 44 publications

Diverse Swards and Mixed-Grazing of Cattle and Sheep for Improved Productivity

Diverse Swards and Mixed-Grazing of Cattle and Sheep for Improved Productivity

Fertilizer addition lessens the flux of microbial carbon to higher trophic levels in soil food webs of grassland

Nitrogen addition and harvest frequency rather than initial plant species composition determine vertical structure and light interception in grasslands

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