Photo: Cows grazing a multispecies sward at UCD’s Lyons Farm in Ireland by Shona Baker. 

Multispecies swards for sustainable grazing 

Location: Ireland
Start date: May 2025; Duration: 4 year
Partners: University College Dublin (UCD), Teagasc – the Agriculture and Food Development Authority, BiOrbic, VistaMilk, Datamars Sustainability Foundation.
Project partner website: link

This project aims to accelerate the adoption of multispecies swards (MSS) in livestock systems. By integrating scientific research, practical tools, and stakeholder engagement, the project seeks to demonstrate how the adoption of MSS enhances beef production’s sustainability, resilience, and productivity while supporting climate and biodiversity goals.

Desired project outcomes

• Increased awareness of the benefits of MSS adoption among farming communities and policymakers in the EU.
• Enhanced understanding of barriers and levers for MSS adoption.
• Successful development of a non-glyphosate MSS establishment methodology.
• There is wider adoption of multispecies swards (MSS) in agricultural systems.

Project approach:

Four work programmes will be conducted by a PhD or Master’s student in collaboration with their supervisors and wider research groups:

1. Focuses on understanding what helps or hinders farmers in adopting MSS to boost sustainability in grass-based farming through farmer engagement workshops.
2. Focuses on making beef production on MSS more sustainable by integrating advanced animal management strategies such as improved genetics, targeted feeding, and finishing methods.
3. Investigates how MSS can improve soil carbon storage and overall soil health compared to grass or grass-clover pastures, woodlands and arable land.
4. Focuses on finding effective ways to establish MSS without relying on herbicides like glyphosate, which raise environmental and health concerns.

DMSF Focus and Collaboration:

1. Farmer focus: With the encouragement and support of DMSF, the project centers farmers along with the academic partners, and has included a full social science workstream with multi-stakeholder engagement of farmers to explore barriers and enablers to adoption as well as ensure that the farmer’s voice on the ground circulates back up into academia.
2. Regenerative animal integration: The DMSF-partner collaboration process enabled animal integration in the project, as well as regenerative practices in general, including exploring MSS establishment methods without the use of glyphosate or other herbicides.
3. Impact measurement: The rigorous practices of the academic partners align fully with DMSF’s focus on showing measurable impact by bridging scientific research with real-world farming. Moreover, by facilitating a collaboration between UCD and Teagasc, we ensured that the social, cultural and economic aspects of MSS adoption are accounted for, looking at barriers and enablers via multistakeholder engagement including farmers, scientists, policymakers, and industry.

Why it matters & how this project’s impact is scalable:

The project will not only advance science but also provide actionable, evidence-based information for farmers looking to improve productivity and resilience through the establishment of multi-species swards. It gives farmers a way to contribute to climate and biodiversity goals and provides information to policymakers as they refine government programs encouraging MSS adoption. The multi-disciplinary approach of this project, with the natural and social sciences working together, could serve as a blueprint for approaching other regenerative agriculture practice studies at agriculture-focused universities. Hopefully, with time, the project outcomes will demonstrate that the multi-pronged approach including practical guidance, farmer voices and holistic measurement can accelerate adoption of key regenerative agriculture practices.