A Promising Plant

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30919, 27 November 1965, Page 10

A Promising Plant

A very promising new summer fodder crop, a hybrid sudangrass known as Trudan, which has been developed in the United States will be grown in Canterbury this summer.

According to Mr D. J. G. Davies, an instructor in agriculture with the Department of Agriculture in Christchurch, it did particularly well when grown in the Gisborne area last summer byMr Thomas Corson junior who imported it from the United States. Mr Corson has given it the colourful description—“the fastest thing on roots.” Mr Davies understands that it grew at a tidy three inches a day in the Gisborne district last summer and cut at 6ft high three times it yielded 60 tons of forage to the acre.

Actually Mr Davies said that the recommended grazing level was 40 inches so that in fact about six cuts would have been obtained had it been cut at this level. 60 Tons If yields of the order of 60 tons could be obtained, Mr Davies said it would be very good. In this part of the world a 40 ton to the acre vield from maize was regarded as being a very good crop. Mr Davies said it was seed of this hybrid that was being distributed this season by a local seeds merchant. Last season in the Halswell district Mr Davies grew in observational plots a sorghumsudangrass hybrid alongside maize to compare their production.

Unlike maize and like lucerne he said that this hybrid had the ability to tiller at the base throwing fresh shoots after grazing or cutting. Under optimum conditions cutting or grazing at the recommended 36 inch level three or four grazings or cuttings would be obtained in a season.

This plant might grow at the rate of about two inches a day.

It was superior to maize in respect of protein and in a small hand feeding trial dairy cows had preferred it to best leafy maize. Under extremely dry conditions or conditions of extreme cold Mr Davies said that "there could be a danger of poisoning stock through feeding it due to prussic acid content. It was thought, however, that under New Zeai land conditions such a danger i would be rare. Where there (was such a danger, Mr Davies

said that the material could be safely cut and made into hay or silage.

Mr Davies said that this hybrid could be sown from mid-November to the end of November in 12 or 14 inch rows at 81b to 101 b and where irrigation was used the seeding rate could be increased to about 151 b.

Arrangements had been made by the department for a further importation of a small quantity of hybrid sor-ghum-sudangrass called Zulu through the courtesy of Queensland Pedigree Seed Distributors. Mr Davies said it was intended to distribute it to dairy farmers who would also be growing the hybrid sudangrass, Trudan. and who also grew maize, so that a comparison would be obtained of the three.

The hybrid Sudangrass, he said, also had the ability to tiller after cutting or grazing and it produced a much finer stem than the sorghumsudangrass. The sudangrass was probably superior from the feed point of view to the sorghum-sudangrass having a slightly higher protein content and also a lower prussic acid content but this would have to be checked. Mr Corson claimed that it had a feed value similar to lucerne with a protein content of 17 to 18 per cent.

Because the seed was smaller than in the case of the sorghum-sudangrass the recommended seeding rate was 301 b to the acre in 7-inch rows and down to 151 b in 14inch rows, but in the United States best results had been obtained with rows 20 inches apart.

Mr Davies said that the new grass might do away with the need to grow a maize crop and obviate the difficulty of making maize into silage. It was a plant with a higher protein level and had a sugar content like maize that was more than adequate for silage making. Mr Davies thinks that it could have a place on sheep properties as well as dairy farms. It can be made into hay under more difficult conditions than other plants and would provide acceptable hay or silage. Both the sorghum-sudan-grass hybrids and the sudangrass hybrids make maximum recovery when they are grazed down to about six inches and no lower. Reporting on a further refinement of the sudangrass hybrid known as Trudan 2. the “Missouri Ruralist” says “the sudangrass hybrid grows as fast or even faster (than

sorghum-sudangrass), stools out more, has finer leaves, contains less prussic acid, and holds up better with repeated cuttings. And cows prefer the taste of this new crop over sorghum-sudangrasses." These seemingly remarkable sudangrass hybrids could well be a useful source of material for storage in silos and mechanical feeding to livestock.