Sudan Grass

Sudan grass: see sorghum.

---

Sudan Grass 

(Sorghum sudanense), also Sudan, an annual herbaceous plant of the family Gramineae. Sudan grass forms a bush of numerous leafy culms measuring 0.5 to 3 m in height; under optimum conditions there may be as many as 120 culms. The light-green leaves are lanceolate and smooth. The inflorescence is a branched panicle measuring about 40 cm long. The fruit is a grain.

Sudan grass grows wild in the Nile Valley of Africa. It is cultivated in Western Europe, North Africa, East Africa, India, North America (USA), South America, and Australia. In the USSR the plant is cultivated for forage (green mass, hay, silage); it is raised in Kazakhstan, the Altai Krai, the Far East, and the southern and southeastern regions of the European USSR.

Sudan grass grows well after grazing and mowing. The yield is up to 400 quintals per hectare (ha) of green mass, 50–80 quintals per ha of hay, and 8–13 quintals per ha of seeds. One hundred kg of hay contains 57 feed units and 7.4 kg of digestible protein. Sudan grass is used as an aftercrop and in mixed plantings with vetchling, soybeans, vetch, and sunflowers.

REFERENCES

Solov’ev, B. F. Sudanskaia trava. Moscow, 1960.
Odnoletnie kormovye kul’tury. Moscow, 1967.