Weed suppression enhanced by increasing functional trait dispersion and resource capture in forage ley mixtures

Weeds in intensively managed grassland can result in substantial losses of forage yield and quality. We studied whether weeds could be suppressed sustainably by use of functionally diverse grassland mixtures with high resource capture and biomass yield. To this aim, growth of planted phytometers and of spontaneously establishing, unsown species were evaluated. To represent weeds, seedlings of five model species were grown up as phytometer plants...