The impact of contrasting management conditions on clover performance

摘要

The current focus on sustainable agricultural production has increased interest in using forap legumes to reduce inorganic-N inputs in Norwegian agriculture. This study quantified til impact of tractor traffic, fertilization level and clover inclusionrate on grassland yield, clova content in herbage and N_2 fixation in field experiments on mineral soils in northern, wester, and mountainous regions of Norway. Three seed mixes (0, 15, 30% clover in total seed weight), two N fertilizer rates (110, 170kg N ha~(-1)) and three levels of post-cut tractor traffic were examined. Preliminary results suggest that tractor traffic exerts site-specific effects on grassland yield, clover content and N_2 fixation. Tractor traffic also reduced fertilizcr-use efficiency. Increased N fertilizer level strongly reduced the clover content in the grass-clover swards, thereby decreasing N_2 fixation. Increased clover inclusion rate had small positive effects on the parameters studied.