Herbage from legumes or legume-rich swards potentially has lower concentrations of water soluble carbohydrates (= wsc) and a higher buffering capacity (= bc) than grass grown in pure stands. The analysis of three forage legumes (= Trifolium repens, Tri-folium pratense and Lotus corniculatus) in monoculture and mixtures (= 50/50) with the grass species Festuca rubra demonstrates, that the ratio of wsc concentration to bc is critical low, especially when the herbage is harvested at physiological young stages to obtain a higher forage quality. This means an increased risk for silage mak-ing, especially at DM contents which are below 30%. New breedings of the grass spe-cies Lolium perenne with higher sugar contents offer a possibility to increase the wsc concentration in grass/legume mixtures. Our studies show, that the tested high-sugar grass is suitable to increase the wsc concentrations in mixture. However, the grass has grown in monoculture. A present project is focussed on the open question if the advantage of high-sugar varieties is also evident in legume/grass mixtures
