A significant portion of the irrigated acreage in the intermountain western U.S. is comprised of cool season grass pastures. Droughts, coupled with increasing demands for limited water supplies in the region, have decreased the water volumes available for irrigating these pastures and other crops. Consequently, relationship between crop yield and irrigation (water production functions) should b...

Research in the genetic engineering of alfalfa is currently underway to improve alfalfa for traits such as tolerance to abiotic and biotic stresses, forage quality, and herbicide resistance. Alfalfa is also being engineered to produce novel compounds for industrial and diagnostic purposes. This research will likely lead to the production of improved cultivars, as well as new uses for alfalfa.

Red clover (Trifolium pratense L.) is one of the most important legume forage species in temperate livestock agriculture. Tetraploid red clover cultivars are generally producing less seed than diploid cultivars. Improving the seed setting potential of tetraploid cultivars is necessary to utilize the high forage quality and environmentally sustainable nitrogen fixation ability of red clover. In ...

Many of the major forage species used in agriculture are outcrossing and rely on the exchange of pollen between individuals for reproduction; this includes the major species used for dairy production in grazing systems: perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) and white clover (Trifolium repens L.). Cultivars of these species have been co-existing since contrasting cultivars were developed using ...

field trials. The use of row-column analysis or neighbor analysis has been shown to increase the precision of a Spatial analyses of yield trials are a powerful method of adjusting large number of grain yield trials (Cullis and Gleeson, treatment means for spatial variation and improving statistical precision of mean estimation. Because yield trials are typically repeated 1989; Cullis and Gleeso...

Tremblay, G. F., Bélanger, G., McRae, K. B. and Michaud, R. 2002. Leaf and stem dry matter digestibility and ruminal undegradable proteins of alfalfa cultivars. Can. J. Plant Sci. 82: 383–393. Increased dry matter digestibility and ruminal undegradable protein (RUP) concentration are traits highly ranked to improve the nutritive value of forage legumes. Whole-plant, leaf, and stem samples of 27...

A field experiment to compare forage yield and quality of eight sorghum cultivars/genotypes namely JS-263, JS88, Hegari, F-9601, F-9603, F9706, F-9806 and F-9809 was conducted at the Agronomic Research Area, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad during the year 2008. Significant differences were observed among the genotypes for forage yield and quality. The variety F-9603 produced significantly...

The economics of farming continues to be one of the major agricultural problems in the U.S. One important component of the solution is to increase profitability by crop improvement through plant breeding. Improved forage cultivars provide economic opportunities for livestock and crop farming operations and promote a more stable, sustainable agriculture. Farmers benefit by greater animal product...