Morphology, Morphogenesis and Production of Tanzânia Grass, Submitted to Either Fixed or Variable Resting Period

Abstract

This work was carried out at Embrapa. Milk cattle and experimental field were located in Coronel Pacheco, MG, Brazil, in the period of December 2008 to May 2009. It was aimed to evaluate the effect of two different defoliation intervals on the morphology and morphogenetic characteristics of Tanzania grass (Urochloa maxima) pasture. The treatments consisted of evaluations of 2 management strategies on pastures were: 1) IL95—consisted of the entry of animals into the pickets when the pasture reached 95% of interception of photosynthetically active radiation, with 3 days of picket occupation and 2) FIXED—pasture managed with 30 days of defoliation interval and 3 days of picket occupation. Ten cows (Holstein × Zebu) recently delivered were used to effectuate the grazer of the evaluated areas. The measured variables were analyzed by the mist model. The best model selection was based on the Akaike information criterion, in which the likelihood was evaluated for the different proposed models, where the composed symmetry had the better adjustment to the model. The management caused differences on the biomass production and on the morphological and morphogenetic structure of Tanzania grass, in which the criterion of interception of photosynthetically active radiation allowed higher efficiency on the area usage.