agronomy Article The Mineral Composition of Wild-Type and Cultivated Varieties of Pasture Species Tegan Darch 1,* , Steve P. McGrath 2 , Michael R. F. Lee 1,3 , Deborah A. Beaumont 1 , Martin S. A. Blackwell 1, Claire A. Horrocks 1, Jessica Evans 4 and Jonathan Storkey 2 1 Sustainable Agriculture Sciences, Rothamsted Research, North Wyke, Okehampton, Devon EX20 2SB, UK;
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[email protected] (C.A.H.) 2 Sustainable Agriculture Sciences, Rothamsted Research, Harpenden, Hertfordshire AL5 2JQ, UK;
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[email protected] (J.S.) 3 Bristol Veterinary School, University of Bristol, Langford, Somerset BS40 5DU, UK 4 Computational and Analytical Sciences, Rothamsted Research, Harpenden, Hertfordshire AL5 2JQ, UK;
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[email protected] Received: 21 August 2020; Accepted: 22 September 2020; Published: 24 September 2020 Abstract: Mineral deficiencies in livestock are often prevented by using prophylactic supplementation, which is imprecise and inefficient. Instead, the trend for increased species diversity in swards is an opportunity to improve mineral concentrations in the basal diet. Currently, there are limited data on the mineral concentrations of different species and botanical groups, particularly for I and Se, which are among the most deficient minerals in livestock diets. We grew 21 pasture species, including some cultivar/wild type comparisons, of grasses, legumes and forbs, as single species stands in a pot study in a standard growth medium.