Producing lamb with good eating quality – flavour, tenderness and juiciness – is essential for consumer satisfaction. Forages such as lucerne and plantain can play an important role in sustainable lamb production; however, it is important to ensure that these feeds do not introduce undesirable flavours. We evaluated the potential for backgrounding (post-weaning) and finishing diets (11 weeks pre-slaughter) to affect lamb eating quality. Lambs were backgrounded on either (1) a combination of three cultivars of perennial ryegrass or (2) a combination of lucerne, ryegrass and fescue and then finished (76 days) on one of three forages; (1) perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne), (2) lucerne (Medicago sativa) or (3) plantain (Plantago lanceolota). After slaughter, striploin (M. longissimus thoracis et lumborum) and topside (M. semimembranosus) muscles were removed. Grilled striploins were subjected to consumer acceptance studies and quantitative descriptive analysis by a trained sensory panel. Grilled meat from lambs finished on lucerne and plantain was equally or more acceptable than on ryegrass, with no negative impacts on flavour. The backgrounding system affected flavour attributes as well as tenderness. Grilled lamb volatiles were comprehensively characterised by gas-chromatography-mass spectrometry-olfactometry. Specific flavour-related sensory attributes were modelled using semi-quantitative volatile data. Targeted analysis of branch-chained fatty acids, 4-methylphenol and 3-methylindole indicated no significant effects of backgrounding regime or finishing feed. We conclude that neither lucerne nor plantain had negative impacts on lamb flavour although different combinations of backgrounding and finishing feeds may affect lamb tenderness.

Management of nutrition during pregnancy for maternal composite ewes has the potential to improve lamb production and survival in prime lamb production systems but existing condition score (CS) guidelines developed for Merinos may not be appropriate for the optimum production of maternal ewes. To address this, three replicated experiments were conducted at two research sites in Victoria and one in Western Australia. Ewes (781–800 per site) were allocated to four CS treatments following pregnancy scanning (~Day 50) and differentially fed to reach approximate targets of CS 2.4, 2.8, 3.2 and 3.6 by lambing. Single and multiple bearing ewes grazed together, and nutritional treatments were applied until the end of lambing after which ewes and lambs were aggregated into management groups containing all treatments. At lambing, maternal ewe liveweight had a range between treatments of 13.7–19.1 kg (average 16.4 kg) and CS varied by 1.1–1.5 of a CS (average 1.24). Across site analysis indicated that lamb birthweight and weaning weight increased with application of higher CS treatments (P < 0.001). There was also an improvement in survival of multiple born lambs with increasing CS at lambing (P < 0.001). Birthweight was significantly related to survival (P < 0.001) at all sites with no significant effect of birth type on lamb survival. Changes in birthweight and weaning weight could be predicted from ewe joining liveweight, ewe liveweight change to Day 90 and ewe liveweight change Day 90 to lambing. The coefficients derived for each of these effects were similar to those found in previous experiments examining Merino and crossbred Border Leicester Merino ewes. The optimum CS targets for multiple bearing maternal composite ewes may be higher than the industry recommended target for Merino ewes based on advantages in lamb survival and weaning weight.

Bituminaria bituminosa (L.) C.H. Stirton, commonly known as tedera, is a perennial legume of interest in Australia due to its adaptation to Mediterranean environments. Field experiments were conducted at two sites in Victoria, Australia, a high rainfall site at Hamilton and a low rainfall site at Bealiba, to evaluate tedera var. albomarginata lines against other forage species. At Hamilton, tedera achieved similar seedling densities to lucerne (Medicago sativa L.) following sowings in late spring 2009 and early winter 2010 (30–60 seedlings/m2). Forage production from the spring-sown tedera was between 1.0 and 2.3 t DM/ha at harvests in March and May 2010, but from May onwards the species failed to remain productive and its content in the swards decreased to become <10%. Forage production from all early winter-sown tedera swards was low (<0.5 t DM/ha). At Bealiba, some of the tedera lines outyielded lucerne. The tedera at Bealiba had a vigour rating of 8.3, on a scale of 1–10, in the summer of 2008–09, after surviving three summers. The tedera lines evaluated are unlikely to persist in cold wet winter environments but in drier zones tedera may persist and offer good DM yields of high nutritive value.

Offering livestock dietary choice through access to different pasture species enables livestock to regulate their own feed intake, select for nutrients and minerals, balance rumen health and display natural grazing and foraging behaviours, which could in turn result in increased livestock productivity. An experiment was conducted at Hamilton, Victoria, Australia, to test the hypothesis that offering lambs dietary choice through spatially separated combinations of pasture species would improve lamb performance, relative to lambs with no dietary choice. The experiment tested seven treatments, replicated four times in a randomised complete block design with plot sizes of 1 ± 0.1 ha. The treatments were: 100% perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) (PR), 100% plantain (Plantago lanceolata L.) (PL), 100% lucerne (Medicago sativa L.) (LU), 50 : 50 perennial ryegrass/plantain (PR + PL), 50 : 50 perennial ryegrass/lucerne (PR + LU), 50 : 50 plantain/lucerne (PL + LU) and 33 : 33 : 33 perennial ryegrass/plantain/lucerne (PR + PL + LU). In the multiple species swards, the pasture species were separated spatially (by area). Plots were grazed by weaned lambs between March and June 2011. Pre-grazing herbage mass during March and April were highest (P < 0.05) from the lucerne and lowest (P < 0.05) from the plantain, with lucerne producing 4.5–5.5 t DM/ha during this time, whereas the perennial ryegrass and plantain produced 3.5–3.9 t DM/ha and 2.3–3.0 t DM/ha, respectively. Herbage disappearance (calculated estimate of feed intake) was highest (P < 0.05) from the lucerne and lowest (P < 0.05) from the plantain during March and April. Leaf crude protein between the perennial ryegrass and plantain did not differ (P > 0.05) and were lower (P < 0.05) than the lucerne, but the perennial ryegrass and plantain had higher (P < 0.05) leaf on offer (kg DM/ha). Plantain leaf had higher (P < 0.05) Fe, Zn, Co, Ca and S than the perennial ryegrass leaf and higher (P < 0.05) Se, Cu, Mg, Na and Cl than the perennial ryegrass and lucerne leaf and a more negative (P < 0.05) dietary cation : anion difference. The agronomic data presented in this paper provides support for the hypothesis, with lambs showing dietary preferences between pasture species and morphological components, and forms to basis for why these preferences exist. The two subsequent papers show how offering lambs dietary choice affected the performance of male lambs to slaughter and female lambs to first joining.

Throughout many areas of Australia, climatic conditions create a unique challenge for pasture producers due to the combined effects of heat and moisture deficit stress over summer/early autumn, and cold-temperature stress with transient waterlogging over winter and early spring. To survive and remain productive in this environment, pasture species must possess a wide range of adaptive traits, with few species being suited to both drought stress and waterlogging stress. Tall fescue (Lolium arundinaceum syn. Festuca arundinacea Schreb.) is a perennial pasture grass that is not widely used in Australia, where perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) and phalaris (Phalaris aquatica L.) are the predominant improved pasture species. Summeractive cultivars of tall fescue may, however, possess adaptive traits (traits not possessed by other pasture grasses) that are useful in Australia. Summer-active tall fescue is generally more heat tolerant and deeper rooted than perennial ryegrass, with comparable nutritive value over much of the year and the benefit of improved summer productivity. To sustain a high level of summer growth and persistence, it is likely that summer-active cultivars of tall fescue will be specifically suited to rainfall zones receiving 600 mm/year, with some summer rainfall. In areas where summer rainfall is unreliable, summer-active tall fescue may be suited to heavy textured waterlogging-prone soils that provide a source of stored soil moisture available for extraction over summer. This review documents the potential usefulness of summer-active tall fescue as a forage species in the high-rainfall zone (600 mm) of Australia, particularly areas that experience the combined stresses of hot and dry summer conditions with cold conditions and transient waterlogging during winter. This literature review considers research from around the world, with particular reference to New Zealand studies, which are highly relevant to the Australian environment. The response of tall fescue to a range of establishment, grazing and fertiliser management regimes is discussed, relevant to prevailing environmental conditions and other comparable forage species.