Potentials of Forage Crops in Saudi Arabia PDF

Keywords

grass, forage crops, Saudi Arabia

Abstract

A number of warm season grasses imported from the United States, Australia and Kenya were tried at different locations in the Kingdom to evaluate their production potentials and nutritive values and to compare these with other forage crops. Among these, Blue panic (Panicum antidotale), Klein grass (Panicum coloratum), love grass (Eragrostis superba) and signal grass (Brachiaria decumbens) were found successful at many locations, however Blue panic surpassed all other species producing 150 to 180 tons of green material per hectare per year with 15 to 18% protein. Blue panic was also highly tolerant to high level of salinity (15000 ppm) and drought, using almost 50% less water than alfalfa. Comparison with other forage crops indicate that Blue panic is certainly more productive and nutritionally more acceptable than Rhodes grass (Chloris gayana).