Influence of oat and spring pea mixtures on forage characteristics in different environments

Abstract

Forage mixtures including oat (Avena sativa L.) and spring pea (Pisum sativum L. spp. sativum) provide opportunities to optimize forage production with increasing forage quality, relative to single species stands. Under different climate scenarios, adjusting seeding rates of these mixtures may produce variable results in forage quantity and quality. We conducted a 2-yr study at three study sites to evaluate forage characteristics within mixtures of oat and spring pea stands across a semi-arid to subhumid precipitation gradient. At the western-most and driest location (219 mm March-June precipitation), the oat monoculture produced 16−19% more total biomass than seeding treatments with mixtures of oat and spring pea. In contrast, at the moderate-precipitation site (255 mm precipitation), no differences in total biomass were detected for the oat monoculture and seed mixtures of oat and spring pea. Large variation at the wettest site (339 mm precipitation) limited our ability to detect differences for total biomass production across treatments, but weed pressure in Year 2 of the study reduced forage production. Typically, crude protein (CP) concentration decreased linearly (P < .01) as spring pea decreased in the seeding rate, but CP concentration and total CP yield varied for the seeding rate treatments at the different study sites. Environmental condition may influence the benefit of substituting spring pea into a properly managed oat forage crop to increase forage quality. The contribution of spring pea forage in the total forage biomass of mixtures may be limited, especially in drier conditions.

Plant-Plant Interactions in Pea-Cereal Mixtures Under Heat Stress Conditions of Second Crop Season

“…The differences in climatic condition between the years affect growing condition, hence pea densities and mixtures' effect on crude protein content changed depending on these factors (Figure 2). As our findings, some researchers (Mao et al, 2012;Yang et al, 2018) reported that growing performance of the plant grown as sole or in mixture showed different performances depending on the differences between years (Carr et al, 2004;Pflueger et al, 2020). Although there are some differences, mixtures showed partly consistent CP content among years, pea densities, and mixtures.…”

ROW SEEDING CONFIGURATION REGULATES YIELD, QUALITY AND COMPETITION IN COMMON VETCH (Vicia sativa L.)-SUDANGRASS (Sorghum sudanense (Piper.) Stapf.) MIXTURE

“…The differences in climatic condition between the years affect growing condition, hence row seeding configuration effect on crude protein content changed depending on these factors (Table 1). The growing performance of the plant grown as sole or mixture had showed different performances depending on the differences between years (Carr et al, 2004;Pflueger et al, 2020). The crude protein content was significantly affected by row seeding configuration in the experiment.…”

The effects of grazing cover crops on animal performance and soybean production

“…This was expected as the addition of clover in the OC and OCR treatments, particularly in late‐season samples, would have increased CP concentrations due to greater N concentration within the clover tissue and the senescence of oats and radish to form reproductive organs. The inclusion of a legume with a cereal forage, even at relatively low contributions, has been shown to increase CP concentrations of the entire mix (Carr et al., 2004; Han et al., 2013; Pflueger et al., 2020). Mean TDN, however, was greater in O (58.5%), compared to OC (57.2%) and OCR (56.5%; Table 4).…”