Abstract
Most world collections have too few pasture species. Despite the numerous Australian plant collection tours, accessions have been dominated by Medicago and Trifolium subterraneum, and they are by no means strongly placed to meet the changing demands of new systems and environmental constraints.
There is thus adequate opportunity and need for strategic seed exchange and collection tours which focus on species for specific systems or environments. The improving world databases and the substantial ecological knowledge gained from our own collections allows the definition of likely sites of many target species. Modern technology for climatic comparison and GIS mapping analysis will greatly aid the plant collections of the future.
A priority list is proposed which has an emphasis on free standing, easily harvestible species which will provide alternatives to annually regenerating pasture species and a greater range of environmental adaptation.
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© 1999 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
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Francis, C.M. (1999). The need to collect new pasture and forage species. In: Bennett, S.J., Cocks, P.S. (eds) Genetic Resources of Mediterranean Pasture and Forage Legumes. Current Plant Science and Biotechnology in Agriculture, vol 33. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4776-7_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4776-7_8
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
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