Improving Pasture and Hay Ground with Manure Slurry-Enriched Seeding

摘要

Red Clover (Trifolium pretense) and orchard grass (Dactylis glomerata) were sown in an established smooth bromegrass sod (Bromus inermis) in a Capac fine sandy loam soil (fine-loamy, mixed, active, mesic Aquic Glossudalfs) on the campus of Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan. The red clover and orchardgrass with no-till drilled, frost seeded and slurry seeded with swine slurry. The manure slurry seeding process involved mixing red clover or orchardgrass seed in the slurry tank and passing the seed-laden slurry through drop tubes to the fractured and loosened soil behind each set of aeration tines. No-till drilling and slurry seeding resulted in more uniform stands of red clover and orchard grass than frost seeding. Inter-seeding orchard grass in an existing brome grass stand increased the botanical diversity but did not increase dry matter yield. Compared to the no aeration, no manure control, the no-till, slurry and frost seeded red clover plots increased yields by 105%, 87% and 43%, respectively.