France Sheep rearing is the dominant livestock industry and an old component of farming systems in French Mediterranean regions. It receives mostly winter rains with an average annual rainfall of 700mm and is subject to dry summers.
Mean temperatures are still colder than in other Mediterranean climates.
While the perennial forage are well known and used in Mediterranean France, the potential of annual self-reseeding forage legumes has still to be explored for both intensive or extensive sheep rearing systems. For medics, Ley-farming could be the prominent farming system for European dry areas such as central Spain, but its interest is limited to France where annual rainfalls allow more sophisticated rotations with cereals. The best way to use medics in our country is by over-sowing them in rangelands or in degraded natural pastures to increase both forage production and improve quality. Animals fed on nitrogen-rich forage, such as medics, increase their consumption of ligneous vegetation. This increase in the consumption of ligneous allows, for example, a better control of bushes in fire-break areas.