Grazing alfalfa

Alfagraze was develop through public funding and came at around the same time MIG (Managed Intensive Grazing) was getting introduced. Alfagraze had enough success, that many private companies released a grazing variety. With only very limited success, most of these varieties have disappeared. Alfalfa has bloat problems and the grazing varieties offer only slight improvement over conventional varieties for rotational grazing.
 
If you are grazing alfalfa you may find these papers
interesting.
  
Creeping alfalfa

These varieties have always been important in the Canadian prairies for grazing. They yield 10 to 15% less than non-creeping varieties and therefore have no place for hay production except in limited moisture situations and/or area of extremely severe winters. Creeping varieties are 1 or 2 dormancy, have a deep crown, and are very winter-hardy. The deep crowns receives less damage from animal hooves and because they are buried and, in addition, develop large crown which can compensate for plant losses. The percent creeping plants is usually low under competition from other non-creeping plants. Plants will only creep when they have completely built up root reserves. After alfalfa stands thin, stockpiling would allow root reserves to build up and encourage creeping. I believe there is a place for creeping alfalfa varieties in most pasture mixes.

Solution:
Never buy a pasture mix that only says creeping alfalfa. If a variety is not identified, it is likely, a poor creeper, an old very poor yielding creeper or most likely not even a creeper. Most of the plants even in a good creeping variety do not creep under competitive conditions and therefore 3 to 4 pounds/acre should be the minimum in a pasture mix.


Traffic tolerant varieties

I don't believe university trials have shown any real advantage for these varieties. I haven't seen much activity in this area recently.