Seasonal vegetative establishment and shoot reserves of eastern gamagrass were studied at Woodward, Oklahoma. Single shoots and compound shoots were separated from parent plants and field transplanted twice monthly from January 1977 through September 1978. Shoot reserves were estimated by measurements of mass and percent new growth under etiolation, percent dry matter, and amount and percent total nonstructural carbohydrate (TNC). Etiolated growth, percent dry matter, and TNC were greatest during the winter dormant season and least during May and June. Stand establishment from vegetative propagation followed these same trends, indicating the importance of shoot reserves to vegetative propagation. Etiolated growth followed the same seasonal trends as TNC in shoots but had higher values, indicating that reserves other than carbohydrates measured in the TNC analysis may be important in new shoot growth of eastern gamagrass. Single shoots with high dry weights contained greater amounts of reserves than shoots with low dry weight sampled during the same period. Stand establishment was higher for compound than for single shoots from late June through September, apparently because compound shoots weighed more and contained more reserves than single shoots. Shoots of eastern gamagrass transplanted during the winter dormant season resulted in 90-100% establishment. Vegetative propagation could become an important means of establishing eastern gamagrass if suitable field transplanting equipment were developed. Eastern gamagrass has the potential to become a leading forage producer and engineering research to develop suitable propagation equipment is justified. This material was digitized as part of a cooperative project between the Society for Range Management and the University of Arizona Libraries. The Journal of Range Management archives are made available by the Society for Range Management and the University of Arizona Libraries. Contact lbry-journals@email.arizona.edu for further information. Migrated from OJS platform August 2020
Scholarly peer-reviewed articles published by the Society for Range Management. Access articles on a rolling-window basis from vol. 1, 1948 up to 5 years from the current year. Formerly Journal of Range Management (JRM). More recent content is available by subscription from SRM.