Características estruturais do capim-cayana diferido com duas alturas iniciais

Abstract

The seasonality of forage production is a challenge to obtaining pasture production during the dry season capable of meeting the requirements of animals raised on pastures. One way to overcome this problem is by using pasture management tools, such as deferment. This can be done with pastures of different initial heights, which impacts the forage mass produced and the structure of the deferred pasture. Therefore, the objective of this study was to compare the effect of two initial heights (37 and 46 cm) on the structure of hybrid Brachiaria (syn. Urochloa) cv. Cayana under a 94-day deferment period (from 19/03/2025 to 21/06/2025). The experiment was conducted in Uberlândia (MG), in two paddocks of 2800 m² each. The deferred pasture with the lower initial height (37 cm) showed lower growth (14 cm/period), a higher percentage of vegetative tillers (96%), and a lower percentage of reproductive tillers (4%), but with a lower forage mass (10,127 kg/ha of DM) compared to the deferred pasture with the higher initial height (21 cm/period; 74%; 26% and 11,482 kg/ha of DM, respectively). The lower deferred pasture showed a higher percentage of live leaves (21%) and a lower percentage of live stems (19%) than the higher deferred pasture (15% and 28%, respectively). Thus, reducing the initial pasture height for deferment was efficient in improving the pasture structure, while increasing the initial height provided a greater forage mass at the end of the deferment period.