Evaluation of Desho (Pennisetum pedicellatum Trin) grasses for dry matter yield and nutritive quality for the mid Rift Valley of Oromia at Adami Tulu Agricultural Research Center

Study was conducted at Adami Tulu Agricultural Research Center for two years of 2018 and 2019 cropping season to identify adaptable, high quality and high biomass yielder Desho grass varieties. Four desho grass varieties and Randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications was used. Current result indicated the agronomic performance of leaf length, number of tiller per plant, leaf to stem ratio, plant cover and vigor were not shown significance difference (P>0.05). While plant height (cm) and total dry matter yield (t/ha) were shown significance difference (P<0.05). The highest dry matter yield were produced from KK1-DZF # 591 (15.12 tha-1) and KK2-DZF # 589 (14.04 tha-1) varieties and 0.79 and 0.78 leaf to stem ratio, respectively. DM% content had strong positively correlation with leaf to stem ratio(r= 0.85; P <0.01), plant height(r=0.61; p<0.05). TDMY strongly correlated with PH(r=0.88; p<0.01) and LSR strongly correlated with number of tiller per plant(r=0.89; p<0.01). Based on the result, KK1-DZF # 591 (15.12tha-1) and KK2-DZF # 589 (14.04 tha-1) were well adapted from the varieties evaluated. Therefore, selected varieties should be further evaluated under irrigation condition and demonstrated at around Adami Tulu Agricultural Research Center and similar agroecologies.