Non brassica grazing crop after spring barley

Jerry

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Devon
Looking for ideas for a non brassica winter forage crop to go in after spring barley and ahead of maize next spring. Can be grazed with sheep or cattle. Light sandy free draining ground. Don’t want brassica as it was stubble turnips ahead of the spring barley. Suggestions?

part of the fiend in question mid grazing last year.
7DC600E7-341B-48AE-81F6-C4A0758FF9E2.jpeg
 

unlacedgecko

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Fife
Looking for ideas for a non brassica winter forage crop to go in after spring barley and ahead of maize next spring. Can be grazed with sheep or cattle. Light sandy free draining ground. Don’t want brassica as it was stubble turnips ahead of the spring barley. Suggestions?

part of the fiend in question mid grazing last year.
View attachment 1037608
Oats and berseem clover is one I've seen used to great success as a cheap edible cover crop. Won't give anything like the DM of turnips though.

What about undersowing the barley with grass?
 

Jerry

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Devon
Why not stubble turnips again? We double cropped Spring Barley and stubble turnips on some ground for many years at home without issue.

Failing that, you're looking at spending much more on Westerwolds or Rye I would have thought.

With rape in rotation I don’t want the risk of issues really.

seed cost for westerwolds is what? About £30 an acre?
 

Jerry

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Devon
Oats and berseem clover is one I've seen used to great success as a cheap edible cover crop. Won't give anything like the DM of turnips though.

What about undersowing the barley with grass?

Barley is in ground and well up.
6F9155A0-B784-4E3F-B427-98BB1C7675B0.jpeg


That was taken a week ago.

How soon would you graze oats and clover with it going in late aug?
 

Jerry

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Devon
What I'd like to know is, why does the barley that comes out of the back of the combine grow so well!?

I've tried to replicate it spinning barley on with fert spreader and working ground lightly. But with no success. 🤷‍♂️

I must admit one cheap option is just leave volunteers and graze but don’t think I’d get enough grub
 

Chae1

Member
Location
Aberdeenshire
I must admit one cheap option is just leave volunteers and graze but don’t think I’d get enough grub
We always graze it. Don't think much eating quality in it. They always graze volunteers first then go to feeders once volunteers finished.

Need to speak to combine driver and see if he can spread it wider! All straw baled here.
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
When I looked into it a couple of years ago, forage rye was something like £50/ac just for the seed, which ended the conversation pretty quickly.

I have an arable farming neighbour that’s just gone back into sheep, who has been putting rye based cover crops in after WW, for grazing over winter. Judging by the speed they move over the fields, the DM yield isn’t particularly high, but they are sheep that perhaps won’t stand running too tight.
 

unlacedgecko

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Fife
When I looked into it a couple of years ago, forage rye was something like £50/ac just for the seed, which ended the conversation pretty quickly.

I have an arable farming neighbour that’s just gone back into sheep, who has been putting rye based cover crops in after WW, for grazing over winter. Judging by the speed they move over the fields, the DM yield isn’t particularly high, but they are sheep that perhaps won’t stand running too tight.
My landlords has a budget of £20/ha for cover crop seed. Vetch phacellia and forage radish, plus sunflowers and cereal volunteers.

Sheep did well on it. But not much DM/ha.
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
My landlords has a budget of £20/ha for cover crop seed. Vetch phacellia and forage radish, plus sunflowers and cereal volunteers.

Sheep did well on it. But not much DM/ha.

I assume he’s not sowing much seed per ha for that, and relying mostly on the volunteers?

I’ve no doubt sheep will do well enough on it, but you need a lot of acres of it to keep any number of sheep well.
At the other extreme, I worked out my grazing fodder beet produced about 15t of DM/ha just from the roots (plus another 2-3t from tops?). Obviously that took the place of the cereal crop as well though.
 

Al R

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
West Wales
I must admit one cheap option is just leave volunteers and graze but don’t think I’d get enough grub
We always graze it. Don't think much eating quality in it. They always graze volunteers first then go to feeders once volunteers finished.

Need to speak to combine driver and see if he can spread it wider! All straw baled here.
Once baled go across with a triple K or something very light like that to spread the grains across the field.

Small grains have far more vigour than big grains - hence why grains blown over the back grow better than the big lovely bold grains we all buy in as seed 🤦🏻‍♂️
 

Al R

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
West Wales
I assume he’s not sowing much seed per ha for that, and relying mostly on the volunteers?

I’ve no doubt sheep will do well enough on it, but you need a lot of acres of it to keep any number of sheep well.
At the other extreme, I worked out my grazing fodder beet produced about 15t of DM/ha just from the roots (plus another 2-3t from tops?). Obviously that took the place of the cereal crop as well though.
When I grew a lot of beet we’d weigh the tops and roots pre harvesting and would work on 40t/roots would yield 32t/acre of tops going back on as manure. That was with small leafed varieties like blizzard
 

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