Productivity and Quality of Biograss Elephant Grass (Pennisetum Purpureum) as Forage

Abstract

Biograss elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum) was generated from the genetic engineering process of elephant grass developed by the Bogor Institute of Biotechnology and Genetics. The research was conducted in the AIAT, Central Java experimental garden from January to December 2021, using two grass cultivars, namely Biograss RG 08 and RG 11. The grass cultivar RG08 had average clump number of 6 stems, plant height of 296.48 cm, 16 leaves, and 1.95 kg biomass/stem. The DM production was 472.36 tons/ha/year with a carrying capacity of 207 animal units (AU)/ha/year. The grass cultivar RG11 produced average clumps number of 8 stems, plant height of 355.93 cm, leaves number of 21 pieces, and biomass production of 3.76 kg/stem. The dry matter production of the grass was 1165.4 DM tons/ha/year with a carrying capacity of 511 AU/ha/year. Biograss grass is potentially very palatable because the stems are soft, and the stems and leaf axils are hairless. The grasses were also more tolerant of drought compared to Napier Pakchong. RG 11 cut at 90 day-olds contained: 6.97%, 4.79%, 51.65%, 7.92%, 0.09% and 0.15% of crude protein, crude fat, crude fiber, ash, Ca and P, respectively. RG 08 cultivated at 70 days contained: 11.27% crude protein, 14.20% crude fat, 50.87% crude fiber, 12.00% ash, 0.29% Ca and 0.23% P. It is concluded that Biograss RG11 grass had higher productivity but lower quality in terms of nutrient contents compared to RG08.