Manipulating dietary preference to improve animal performance

Abstract

This paper reviews opportunities to improve the diet quality, intake and performance of animals through manipulation of the partial preference commonly shown by grazing animals for different pasture components. Using evidence from the well-worked example of grass–legume pastures, potential opportunities to manipulate preference are highlighted, including: (i) altering plant characteristics to change the relative preference of alternative species or cultivars; (ii) utilising variation in preference among and within animal species; and (iii) working with, rather than against, known preference patterns, by offering forages as spatially separated monocultures within the same paddock or at different times of the day. In all cases, it is argued that is important to consider the full complexities of pasture–animal interactions, in particular, how current diet choices feed back to determine choices available subsequently in the pasture. To develop feeding systems where desirable pasture traits for animal performance are sustained at a high abundance in the diet, plant and animal breeding selection practises and grazing management systems should take greater account of the existence of partial preferences.