Use of barley crops, and combinations of lucerne and Wimmera grass, as pasture for grazing sheep in the semiarid zones of Spain
A. de Vega A E , O. L. Valiente A B , G. Olmos A C and E. Pérez-Calvo A D
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A Departamento de Producción Animal y Ciencia de los Alimentos, Instituto Agroalimentario de Aragón (IA2), Universidad de Zaragoza-CITA, Miguel Servet 177, 50013 Zaragoza, Spain.
B Present address: Departamento de Bromatología, Nutrición y Alimentación Animal, Facultad de Ciencias Veterinarias, Universidad Nacional de Asunción, Ruta Mariscal Estigarribia km 10.5, Campus Universitario San Lorenzo, Paraguay.
C Present address: Colegio de Postgraduados, Campus SLP, Iturbide # 73 Salinas de Hidalgo, SLP 78600, México.
D Present address: DSM Nutritional Products France, Centre de Recherche en Nutrition et Santé Animale, F-68305 Saint-Louis, France.
E Corresponding author. Email: avega@unizar.es
Animal Production Science 58(3) 452-458 https://doi.org/10.1071/AN16788
Submitted: 1 December 2016 Accepted: 14 March 2017 Published: 13 April 2017
Abstract
Taking into account the relationship between rainfall and temperature, 64% of the Spanish territory can be classified as arid (25%) or semiarid (39%). In these areas, vegetal surface includes permanent pastures and drought grasslands (34.0%), fallows (13.4%), winter cereals for grain production (21.2%), forage crops (mainly lucerne, and winter cereals harvested as green forage; 2.6%) and woodland hills. Ruminants in these zones account for 15.4 million head, of which nearly 80% are sheep. In the present paper, the possibilities of integrating sheep in cropping systems are discussed, and an alternative based on the use of permanent sowed prairies (lucerne), self-sowing annuals (Wimmera ryegrass) and winter cereals (barley) will be analysed.
Additional keywords: alfalfa, drylands, ewes.
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