Summary

NEA12 endophyte provides very good animal performance. In some cases NEA12 may cause some ryegrass staggers in lambs, but significantly less than Standard endophyte (SE). NEA12 should not be sown for horses or deer

 

Good animal performance

Ryegrass with NEA12 endophyte has been tested against other endophytes in a worst case scenario as discussed previously, specifically designed to show any animal health issues. The performance of lambs in these trials on NEA12 pastures has been similar to AR1 in terms of lamb liveweight gain.

In circumstances that induce RGS (e.g. drought conditions where stock are pushed to eat into the base of a pasture) animal production maybe reduced.

 

Ryegrass staggers trial

These trials were also designed to cause ryegrass staggers (RGS), with pure ryegrass (without clovers), grown to a very high herbage mass over summer then set-stocked for 4-8 weeks, or until staggers on lambs grazing SE become too serious.

As graphed below, lambs grazing NEA12 took longer to show any signs of RGS then lambs grazing SE, and in the trial had a significantly lower level of RGS than those on SE.

Lambs grazing NEA2 and NEA4 treatments showed no RGS.

 

Trial results

 

Ryegrass staggers (RGS) in 2019 Canterbury lamb trials

It has also been shown that lambs with staggers caused by janthitrems recover much quicker when put onto safe pasture, than lambs that have had staggers on SE pasture.