Equalization of seasonal herbage productivity in the cattle grazing pasture by sheep follow grazing

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The beef cattles start grazing on the mountainous pastures in the late spring in Tohoku region and are grazed rotationally in the some divided paddocks. On that time, however, there is more herahage than the cattle need to intake. In this case, the herbage is remained in excess after grazing and itcauses more dead materials. For solving this problem, I propose to introduce a combination grazing system with sheep as a follower bottom grazer in this study.The standing crop of herbage increased in the middle of June and reached the maximm value in the late of July in a meadow in Towada city, Aomori prefecture. The daily gain of the herbage increased 50kg/ha to 100kg/ha during this period. Quite a number of cattle is need to consume such herbage mass. On the other hand, the number of grazing cattles which are deposited from farmers decreased in the public farm for calf rasing. The vegetation in the sloping paddocks was devastated by less grazing impact. A guideline is porposed for managing the mountainous pasture by the cattle and sheepcombinaion grazing system as follows.1. Gattle grazing has to start before as the herbage mass is less than 4,000kgDM/ha and to continue the grazing until 2,000kgDM/ha at least.2. Sheep as a follower grazer of cattle, has to be continued the grazing until not only leaves but also stems because sheep is more selective for leaf than cattle.3. The dominant plant species during regrowth is able to control by change the grazing animal. Cattle grazing causes the pasture to dominate clover and sheep cause it to grass.