I’m going from wheat in to spring beans. Trying to make a seedbed from spring ploughing is not really an option. Would normally cultivate in the autumn and let the frost break it down over the winter. I wonder whether I would just be better off just putting in winter beans instead.
Cover crops on heavy land
- Thread starter Hjwise
- Start date
yellow belly
Member
- Location
- south west lincolnshire
I meant plant later as in April not March
May planted beans and barley or wheat is too late
if planting in March may as well plant in October blackgrass will -proliferate either way
my main reason for spring planting on heavy land is weed reduction
SilliamWhale
Member
Oats
Would you ever consider grazing cover crops off, rather than spraying?
Yes. Will let local sheep guy graze some next year for free on the premise he moves them when I say.
Would have done it this year but the covers weren’t particularly good to be honest. The seed didn’t cost much but I would say it was a waste of time.
- Location
- Lorette Manitoba
Do you not see a nutrient removal when grazed. I know the sh1t has a value but not compared to the plant itself.
not locally to here but in the northern states,tillage radish seems popular as it punches a hole down and supposed to draw up leached fertilizer and inprove natural internal drainage. My season is too short to have a cover crop but I’ll lightly disc the surface to promote volunteers to grow. Some years they get a good growth and others it’s barely chatted before it’s frozen til spring.
If cover/ stubble turnips are grazed when the land is very wet the land seems to set like concrete and that’s on stony Cotswold brash , I dread to think what it would be like on the “HEAVY LAND”that many of you are farming. A pass with Carrier or similar implement is required to break the extremely hard surface.
From a hedge farmers view and thoughts , these cover / stubble crops must be getting pretty expensive to grow when seed,diesel, labour and extra wear and tear on implements is taken in to account,I entirely agree with @snarling bee .
Depends how you do it.
for us it’s one pass with a 12m drill on usually about 30% of our total area a year. So roughly 3/4 days drilling.
There will be extra wear and tear on the drill because you are using it, the drill uses 5l fuel/hectare.
We have no cultivators. We would also need more tractors and more men if we were in a cultivation/plough system. Which adds to overheads. We run a very low
If you are already in a max till system and want to establish cover crops that way I cannot see the point.
Seed can be as cheap or expensive as you want to make it, we usually do over winters for about £20/ha
you can also get money in CS for doing them and they can add a decent amount of money to a yearly carbon sequestration certificate.
We are using covers because we think they are the right thing for our long term soil building approach, any extra money is a bonus and not the driver.
There is a learning curve and if you haven’t done your homework they can be very negative to the next crop.
I’ve seen local people trying to drilling spring barley into thick covers of green black oats. I could have told them in 30 seconds why that was wrong if they had asked, or 10 minutes on social media or forum could have given them the same answer.
We’ve been fortunate with the weather this year, so I’ve pulled a cultivator through it and will drill with a combination rather than the Rapid. No disaster, just increased establishment costs. Next year I’ll just spin on some oats with the autumn cultivation, spray off early and keep sheep well away.
We haven’t tried it yet and I am apprehensive to to be honest, people say it’s fine if you do as above but I’m not convinced. Like mx7 said I can see the top being puggled down really hard even if you only graze half and keep moving them. Not convinced I want the hassle but may try a bit to scratch an itch
flat lander
we have some variable soul types from blow sand to snot clay
55 acre coming beet half field, heavy half nice silty clay loam
was oats wheat beans wheat then low disturbance subsoil and put ten kg oil radish to keep the seed bed structure , sprayed heavy off in january and put tramlines in and ate lighter part of field, will see if any difference .
going to direct drill beet into it tuesday hopefully , did 25 acre last year and was slow to get going , but could not tell by late summer and did well
got every thing crossed it works again
- Location
- Lincolnshire
If you actually are interested in making money, Heavy land needs an autumn crop planting in good conditions after proper cultivations, thats where 5T crops come from.
Everything else is just messing about with no benefit, but is trendy and you get to play with the latest on trend toys.
Everything else is just messing about with no benefit, but is trendy and you get to play with the latest on trend toys.
The early drilling, heavy cultivation continuous wheat method is broken in most places because of herbicide resistance and blackgrass. If you can still do it then fair play. It worked well in this area for many years until farmers broke the chemistry.
I think early autumn drilling heavy land is the only way to get good crops with a direct drill. I’ve tried spring direct drilling heavy land and anything apart from oats is usually mediocre at best.
Agree. Wheat yields the same if not better than maxi till. Overheads £150/ha less than if our business was geared up for max till.
Can't drill spring beans in the autumn.
Heavy soil in the autumn is a lot nicer to play with than heavy soil in the spring that’s had lots of rain on and then dried out very fast