THE POSSIBILITY OF MAIZE-SOYBEAN AND MAIZE-SUNFLOWER INTERCROPPING ASA TOOL FOR IMPROVING PROTEIN-CONTENT AND FEEDING VALUE OF SILAGE IN CENTRAL-EUROPE CARPATHIAN BASIN

Silage, based on mainly maize, is one of the most important forages fo r ruminants, in Hungary. Since the whole plant maize has been known as energy source containing mainly carbohydrates, while protein is a lim iting component, improving the protein source is one of the most stres sed objective for crop production in Central Europe. At the same time sunflower and mainly soybean has been known as protein surce cultivars . That is why the possibility of maize based intercropping system with both sunflower and soybean was evaluated in 3-yr research program con taining both field trial and chemical analysis or in situ digestibilit y for ruminants, carried out in Keszthely, Hungary. Since the findings of ideal harvest stage for forage sunflower are different, first of a ll time of harvest was investigated. According to both quantitative fe atures or complex values, as digestible dry matter/protein yield, for whole plant sunflower, the flowering is the best harvest stage. During flowering, the ratio of head within the whole plant is increasing, an d that for leaves and stalk with roughly to the same excent are decrea sing. The feeding value of leaves was the same during the investigated period, two weeks before and one week after main flowering stage. In case of head it is increasing until main flowering stage and after thi s it is decreasing. Similar tendency was found in case of stalk, but t he degree of increasing is much more moderate and that of decreasing d eeper, than in case of head. Duration of harvest period for forage sun flower is very short; only 4-7 days. Large differences existed even if the earliest maize and the latest sunflower varieties and hybrids wer e investigated. The same was found in case of soybean. Consequently, s unflower and soybean are not suitable cultivars for maize intercroppin g in Hungary. At the same time, it has to be stressed, that in case of different sowing time. e. g. in different plots, it is possible to pr oduce forage maize, sunflower or soybean and mix them before fermentat ion. That would be the only way to utilise the benefit of soybean and sunflower in improving the silage protein concentration. It could be e specialy important in case of sunflower or soybean as second crop in t he investigated area. These findings are useful to prepare a new techn ology for forage production.