EBI-type rating to help in grass variety selection
Ireland now leads the way in this area, bringing farmers a profit-based index, called the Pasture Profit Index (expressed in euro per hectare) for perennial ryegrass cultivars.
A prototype of the Pasture Profit Index was launched last week at the Teagasc Agricultural College, Clonakilty.
The purpose of the index is to assist grassland farmers to identify the best perennial ryegrass for their farm.
Based on performance values from data collected in grass evaluation trials, the economic merit of each grass variety is assessed for spring, mid-season, and autumn grass dry matter production, for grass quality from April to July, inclusive, and for first and second-cut silage dry matter production and persistency.
Extra weighting is given to the economic value of an extra kilogramme of grass dry matter in spring and autumn, because it supports an extended grazing season.
The results show the Pasture Profit Index ranging from €226/ha to as low as €8/ha per year for 16 cultivars on the current department-recommended list.
As more data becomes available, the index will be assigned to more recommended listed grass varieties.
It can only be assigned to varieties that have data generated from the department’s grass variety evaluation.
Sub-indices offer farmers the opportunity to select cultivars for specific purposes.
For example, if selecting for intensive grazing, the emphasis would be placed on seasonal dry matter yield and quality, with less importance on silage performance.
If selecting a cultivar specifically for silage production, then greater emphasis would be placed on the performance of that cultivar within the silage sub-index.
Speaking at the launch, Frank O’Mara, director of research in Teagasc, said: “The dairy industry has seen at first-hand how the EBI influenced the direction of dairy cattle breeding.
“We expect the Pasture Profit Index to influence grass breeding and the industry in the same way.
“Teagasc now have a National Grassland Database developed, PastureBase Ireland.
“This system is capturing grass production data from commercial farms, which will allow for grass variety performance investigation on grassland farms across enterprises. This is another exciting step forward for the grassland industry.”
This research has been funded mainly through Dairy Levy Research, the Department Research Stimulus Fund, and Teagasc grant-in-aid over recent years.
