Forage

Etymology

This term comes from the Former French, straw , of Germanic origin.

Composition

Generally, fodder consists of herbaceous plants , primarily of the Graminée S and secondarily of the Légumineuse S. In Europe and with the the United States of America, the fodder given to the Ruminant S are generally cultivated in the forms of meadow S, permanent or temporary. The consumption of fodder is done then directly by Pâturage during the season of growth of grass, for the animals of Pacage. It can also be mown and distributed in expenses to the animals raised in enclosures or cages, the rabbit S for example.

Method of forage conservation

To face the needs for the animals in all seasons, it is necessary to preserve fodder. Three methods are mainly used:

the natural drying which makes it possible to produce the Foin;
the dehydration which leads to the Fourrage dehydrated, conditioned of stoppers or granulated;
the Ensilage, mode of conservation per wet process, based on a acid Fermentation more or less controlled by storing the wet matter densément tightened, in silo S or in rollers for the straw or the hay. It presents the fungic risk of production of Toxine S or Bactérie, or of Botulisme when Souris or others Mammifère S or birds were imprisoned in the plants at the time of the cut or the ensilage. The Lead S of hunting or Shooting-trap trapped in the sheets of Corn or Luzerne can also contaminate the acidified fodder, which remains toxic, even after one removed the lead balls from them.

The Straw, by-product of the cultures of Cereal S, can also be used like fodder, in particular for the food of the Bovin S in period of Sécheresse which reduces the availabilities in fodder. However this not very nutritive product and little appétent must be complémenté in Urée (nitrogenized matter) and out of molasses (to improve the craving and digestibility).

FAO enters also some vegetable foresters like fodder.

List fodder plants

Many species of Plante S are cultivated for the Alimentation pets Herbivore S and are included in the category of the fodder plants.

Attention, one should not confuse the term “ fodder ” which indicates the destination with the animal feeds of a vegetable agricultural production, with the terms “ fodder plant ” which indicates a botanical characteristic shared by the very many ones and immense families of plant species, dependant on the life cycle of the plant which did not see and develops only in Symbiose with micro-organisms (often of the Bactéries) within its own vegetable cells (it is here about a case of endosymbiose). Other plants have life cycles in external symbiosis with other species (and Nodosité S in their roots develop), but are not fodder plants, although they are sometimes used also as forages (in this case one uses the fruits in the animal feeds, for example with the fruit trees of which the oak or the chestnut tree).

Moreover, very many fodder plants are also plants with Tubercule where can proliferate of other micro-organisms (even also of other animal species or vegetable macroscopic) which brings many by-products that the plant does not synthesize directly (these organizations exosymbiotic assimilating on the other hand certain products of the plant resulting from photosynthesis, such sugars stored in the bodies of storage of the plant), and are not inevitably considered as fodder (because they produce little assimilable woody vegetable matter in the same way that the pastures). However, the preparation of the tubers (often richer in assimilable elements nutritive than the woody parts of the plant) makes it possible to use them today as fodder, in substitution (with better output in the food plan) of the upper parts of the plant (the woody parts like the stems and foliages who preserve themselves or assimilate with difficulty, or the oleaginous seeds which requires of the animal more energy for the to digest and in Hydrolyze R the nutritive elements).

Thus, the beet or the potato was perceived for a long time like not being a fodder, because one does not intend his upper parts (stems, sheets, infloraisons and seeds) for the food. However they are fodder plants well within the meaning of their botanical characteristic, and these plants today are largely used like forages (by its tubers rich in easily assimilable sugars) for the animal feeds (and more only sugar or vegetable production bound for the human consumption). In fact, it quasi totality of the fodder plants can constitute a fodder (intended for the human food as well as animal).

Contrary, the Soja is largely used like forages (its woody parts, fruits and oleaginous seeds are rich in nutritive elements) but is not a fodder plant (bacterial symbiosis is primarily exogenic in nodosities of the network racinaire, out of the parts intended for the food, and “does not contaminate” not in a endosymbiotic way all the cells of the plant), although it is a Fabacée (a family of plants Légumineuse S) and that many species of this immense family are fodder!

Certain species of Fougère S can have a life cycle fodder, but even in this case, rare are the ferns which can be used as forages (when they are it, one generally uses that their Rhizome S, because the ferns do not produce oleaginous seeds but store their products within the rhizomes, and the upper parts of the plant in her woody stage remain very low in nutritive elements, and the majority of the ferns develop in only exogenic symbiosis, in nodosities of their network racinaire).

Weeded plants

fodder Beet, Beta vulgaris L. subsp. vulgaris , Chénopodiacée S
Cabbage turnip and Swedish turnip, Brassica napus L. VAr napobrassica (L) Rchb., Brassicacée S
fodder Cabbage, Brassica oleracea L. convar, acephala (cd.) Alef., Brassicacée S
fodder or oleiferous Radish, Raphanus sativus L. VAr. oleiformis Sea-green .,
Field bean
Corn, Zea Mays L.
Sorghum fourager, Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench.
Mangel-wurzel
Soya

Plants of meadows

Graminaceous

Velvet bent grass, Agrostis canina L.
Redtop, Agrostis gigantea stoloniferous Roth
Bent-grass, Agrostis will stolonifera L.
held Agrostide, Agrostis capillaris L.
Alpiste of the Canaries
yellowish Avoine, Trisetum flavescens (L.) P. Beauv.
Oats of the meadows
pubescent Oats
Bromine
Bromine of the fields
Bromine drawn up
Bromine inerme
soft Bromine

Bromine, Bromus catharticus Vahl
Bromine, Bromus sitchensis Trin.

Canche cespiteuse
Calamagrostide commune
Grass foot of hen, Cynodon dactylon (L.) Sea-green.
Crételle of the meadows
Dactyl, Dactylis glomerata L.
Fescue

giant Fescue, Festuca gigantea
Fescue hétérophylle
high Fescue, Festuca arundinacea Schreber
Sheep's fescue or fescue of the sheep, Festuca ovina L.
Fescue of the meadows, Festuca pratensis red Hudson
Fétuque Festuca will rubra L.

Fléole

Small timothy, Phleum bertolonii cd.
Timothy, Phleum pratense L.
Phleum of the Alps

Wheat-bearing Flouve odorous
, Arrhenatherum elatius (L.) P. Beauv. ex J.S. and K.B. Presl.
Grass of Harding, Canary grass aquatica L.
Houlque

Houlque woolly
Houlque soft

Mélique leaning
Millet spread out
Molinie blue
Meadow grass

annual Meadow grass, Poa annua L.
Meadow grass of wood, Poa nemoralis L.
Meadow grass of the marshes, Poa palustris L.
Meadow grass of the meadows, Poa pratensis L.
common Meadow grass, Poa trivialis L.

Rye-grass

Ryegrass Italian, Lolium multiflorum Lam.
perennial Ryegrass, perennial Lolium L.
Rye-grass hybrid, Lolium X boucheanum Kunth

Meadow foxtail, Alopecurus pratensis L.

Fabacées

vulnerary Lady's fingers

Fenugrec, Trigonella foenum-graecum L.
Field bean, Vitiated faba L. (partim)

Lotier
Birdsfoot trefoil, Lotus corniculatus L.
Lotier of the marshes
Lupin

white Lupin, Lupinus albus L.
blue Lupin, Lupinus angustifolius L.
Lupin yellow, Lupinus luteus L.

Luzerne

cultivated Luzerne, Medicago sativa L.
Alfalfa lupulin (Iron ore), Medicago lupulina L.

white Melilot
Field pea, Pisum sativum L. (partim)
Sainfoin cultivated, Onobrychis viciifolia Scop.
Sulla, Hedysarum coronarium L.
Clover

Clover Egyptian, Trifolium alexandrinum L.
Clover Alsike, Trifolium hybridum L.
Trèfle incarnates, Trifolium incarnatum L.
purple Trèfle, Trifolium pratense L.
white Clover, Trifolium repens L.
Trèfle of Persia, Trifolium resupinatum L.
Trèfle intermediate

Vetch Hungarian, Vicia pannonica Crantz
common Tare, Vitiated sativa L.
hairy Vetch, tare of Cerdagne, Vicia villosa Roth.

Other families

Phacélie, Phacelia tonacetifolia Benth, Hydrophyllacée S

See too

External bond

fodder plants for the meadows - Site of information on the fodder plants and the meadows for the student stockbreeders, technicians, teachers and

----- Of Kitchen, the fodder consists in lining a Pâtisserie or a Confiserie using a creamy trimming, sweetened, liqueur-like… This trimming is also called “fodder” by metonymy.

Random links: