B.Ag.Sci. Honours (2013)
Animal liveweight gain from lucerne and lucerne/grass mixes (PDF 2.3 MB)
Research Overview
Emma conducted research within a grazed farmlet study at Ashley Dene. The experiment is on-going and has six lucerne paddocks, six lucerne/cocksfoot mixed pastures and six lucerne/brome pastures. Measurements of sheep liveweight, dry matter yield, botanical composition, nutritive value and soil moisture were initiated in spring 2012. Annual animal and plant production from the three pastures was compared. Emma found the lucerne and lucerne/cocksfoot pastures gave similar animal and plant production which were higher than the lucerne/brome. The project was part of Phase II of the Pastoral 21 Programme, funded by the Ministry for Business, Innovation & Employment; Dairy NZ; Beef + Lamb NZ; and Fonterra, and Ministry for Primary Industries, Sustainable Farming Fund. Emma was supervised by Prof. Derrick Moot.
Data collected in subsequent growth seasons formed part of Russell Croy’s Masters thesis (2018).