Mississippi Cool-Season Forage Crop Variety Trials, 2012-2013

Several varieties of forage crops are evaluated every year in Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station (MAFES) small-plot forage trials. Entries are provided by seed companies and state universities and tested at one or more locations across Mississippi. All entries from privately owned companies are tested on a fee basis. Standard varieties may be added by MAFES as a reference for comparison purposes. In addition, varieties of interest may also be added when applicable. Sources of seed are presented in Table 20. This report contains data from 11 small grain varieties, 30 ryegrass varieties, and 10 annual clover varieties. Testing during 2012–13 was done at North Mississippi Branch Experiment Station at Holly Springs, Leveck Animal Research Center Forage Unit at Mississippi State, Coastal Plain Branch Experiment Station at Newton, and White Sands Research Unit at Poplarville. Table 1 shows the total monthly rainfall during the growing season at each location. Average high and low temperatures can be used from Table 2 as a reference to evaluate relative cold tolerance among varieties.

Data presented in Tables 4–19 can be used to evaluate the performance of each forage crop within its respective trial. Mean and harvest comparisons were statistically evaluated by using the least significant difference (LSD) at the probability level of α = 0.05. The LSD value represents the amount of yield (pounds per acre) that must be observed between any two varieties to determine if the difference was due to variety variation alone.

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