Lamb Production and Pasture Development in Agrivoltaics Production System

Agrivoltaic systems mutually benefit agricultural production and solar energy with a dual-use of land in a single location. Lamb growth and pasture production from traditional open pastures and solar pastures in agrivoltaic systems over 2 years in Oregon demonstrated that weaned Polypay lambs grew at 120 and 119 g head1 d 1 in solar and open pastures, respectively in spring 2019 (P = 0.90). The liveweight production between solar (1.5 kg ha1 d 1 ) and open pastures (1.3 kg ha1 d 1 ) were comparable (P = 0.67). Similarly, lamb liveweight gains and liveweight productions were comparable in both solar (89 g head1 d 1 ; 4.6 kg ha1 d 1 ) and open (92 g head1 d 1 ; 5.0 kg ha1 d 1 ) pastures (all P > 0.05) in 2020. The results from our grazing study indicated that lower herbage mass available in solar pastures was offset by higher forage quality, resulting in similar spring lamb production to open pastures. Our ongoing research involving the development of three pasture types (simple grass-clover, herbal ley, and legume mixtures) resulted in liveweight gains of 175, 200 and 224 g head-1 day-1 for grass-clover, herbal ley, and legume pastures, respectively. Our findings suggest that land productivity could be increased through combining sheep grazing on improved pastures and solar energy production on the same land in agrivoltaics systems.