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We investigated the water soluble carbohydrate (WSC) concentrations of forages and the chemical composition, the fermentation quality, and the nutritive value of silage made from orchardgrassperennial ryegrass (OG-PR) mixed meadow, harvested early and three times a year at short intervals, compared to those made from timothy (TY) meadow, harvested twice a year in Hokkaido. The WSC concentration of OG-PR first cut forage was higher than those of other forages. OG-PR first cut silage showed good fermentation quality with high lactate acid content. OG-PR silage contained more crude protein and total digestive nutrients estimated by total fecal collection method using wether, and less fiber than TY silage. These results indicated that grass silage made from OG-PR mixed meadow, harvested early and at short intervals, has advantages in improving the fermentation quality and the nutritive value.

High-quality forages are essential diets for high-yielding dairy cows. Grass silage is the main dietary source for dairy cow in Japan. In northern regions of Japan, mainly timothy (Phleum pratense L.) is cultivated as the material for grass silage to optimize the dry matter (DM) yield. However, timothy is less competitive than other grass species, and the DM yield and forage quality are thus reduced due to invasion of rhizomatous grass weeds such as quackgrass and reed canarygrass to the timothy-based grassland in those regions (Deguchi, 2016;Kitamura, 2016). Compared to timothy, orchardgrass (Dactylis glomerate L.) is more competitive and has greater regrowth ability, and perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) has greater water-soluble carbohydrate content (Masuko, Ono, Furukawa, & Otani, 1994). In addition, these grass species are suitable for grazing and early and short interval harvesting, whereas timothy is not suitable for early harvesting to maintain grassland persistency and nutri

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