Grassland management for year‐round grazing with regard to organic beef production in the warm regions of Japan

摘要

Recently, Japan has been producing surplus manure because feed has been imported at 19 million TDN t/year despite the meager amount of manure that has been exported.The technique of using more manure in grasslands along with an appropriate ecosystem comprising the soil‐plant‐animal cycle is necessary.Organic farming technique is a typical example of such a method that uses only manure to maintain the fertility of farmlands.In this study, we considered the appropriate amounts of cattle and chicken manure that need to be applied in order to achieve productivity similar to that achieved by chemical fertilizer application ; grazing grasslands of Guineagrass ( Punicum maximum Jacq.) and Italian ryegrass ( Lolium multi f lorum Lam.) were studied to evaluate grassland productivity based on the daily gain of steers.