Effects of Fertilizer Types and Spacing on Biomass Yield and Chemical Composition of Brachiaria Hybrid Mulato II Grass Grown in Semi-Arid Zone in Sri Lanka

Brachiaria species have gained widespread usage in the tropics and subtropics. Brachiaria Mulato II, a recently in-troduced hybrid cultivar within the Brachiaria genus, has not undergone comprehensive agronomic evaluation in Sri Lanka. This experiment was conducted to evaluate the ef-fects of fertilizer types (U625-control: 17-12-14-0-0, com-mercial mixture-CM1: 14-8-12-1-7, and CM2: 14-6-20-1-7; N-P-K-S-Mg) and plant spacings (15×50 cm and 30×50 cm) on dry matter yield (DMY), morphological characteristics (plant height-PH, leaf-to-stem ratio-LSR, and number of till-ers per plant-NTPP), and chemical composition (ash, crude protein-CP, Neutral detergent fiber-NDF, and acid detergent fiber-ADF) of Mulato II grass. The experiment was con-ducted in Hambantota district Sri Lanka under irrigated conditions. The experimental design was a factorial layout (3×2) in a randomized complete block design with four rep-lications. PH, NTPP, LSR, DMY, and ASH content are signifi-cantly different within fertilizer types while all the parame-ters except ASH are significantly different within spacing. Overall, the highest PH, DMY, and ADF were shown by close spacing while wide spacing showed high NTPP, LSR, CP and NDF. Treatments CM1 (11.2 t/ha) and CM2 (11.7 t/ha) rec-orded the highest and statistically similar DMY values, which were significantly greater than that of the control (9.6 t/ha). It can be recommended that Mulato II has the potential to be cultivated using CM1 and CM2 having com-petitive DMY, CP, NDF, and ASH content compared to com-monly used improved grasses in the dry zones of Sri Lanka. The research indicates that close spacing increases the for-age DMY while wide spacing increases the forage quality.