direct drill spring barley and stubble turnips

[Billy Sugger]

i am on slighly acidic light sandy soil and we have grown fodder beet, kale and stubble turnips for outwintering our 500 dry cows and followers this is grown by the arable dept of this large estate. The land is habitually ploughed and cultivated.We are at the forfront of the rotation and consquently the yields of these forage crops arnt impressive .
I have practised the SB/ST rotation before on chalk ,obviously the main worry is summer drought , i'm thinking that the increase in our soil organic matter currently around 2,5% will help soil biology .There are plenty of earthworms and even molehills when we finish with the stock.So will DD this land with Spring Barley be my downfall ? any helpful advice ?
We would look to cut as wholecrop some of the barley for some of the turnips to get away as insurance .
cheers
Billy

 

[Brisel]

Can you strip till the spring barley? I'd be worried about surface compaction after turnips. I have had a continuous rotation of turnips/spring barley on chalk for beef cattle but sand doesn't hold a natural structure as well.

What pH is the soil? Lots of brassica in the rotation won't tolerate acidity & it would be shame to let clubroot in.

 

[Billy Sugger]

thanks brisel our ph is just over 6 to 6.4 what are your preps for both crops ?

 

[Brisel]

Get some lime on it! That kind of acidity will knacker both crops especially the turnips.

What kind of drill do you have access to? My turnips went in with a Vaderstad Rapid, just using the front discs to scratch enough surface crumb to ensure soil around the seed. Watch your arable boys - no dust coming from the drill = no drilling beacuse it's too wet. My spring barley afterwards was ploughed partly due to take ruts out of the turnips where we were supplementary feeding some old silage when it looked as though they were going to finish then before I pulled them out onto grass in March.

 

[Billy Sugger]

thanks can lime no probs
we normally use contractors Vaderstad too ,seems OTT for turnips but ok for SB would have thought it would take out ruts, we have ruts too!

 

[neilo]

thanks can lime no probs
we normally use contractors Vaderstad too ,seems OTT for turnips but ok for SB would have thought it would take out ruts, we have ruts too!

A Vaddy will fair blitz over drilling turnips and do a good job on arable land. Not sure it would be great if it's coming out of grass though?

If you have ruts, or the compaction from grazing cattle over winter, I would have thought it would be deeper than DD depths and would need breaking up somehow. Cattle will be compacting deeper than sheep will. I still wouldn't plough it though, that just moves the panned layer lower.

Isn't @BSH doing the same thing on similar soil?

 

[Billy Sugger]

yes i need to see Richard he's not too far away . I have dug some holes cmpaction doesnt seem to bad ,worms n moles are coping

 

[H.Jackson]

Turnip ground here now the sheep have finished top inch is tight but nothing to impede root growth if we can get the coulters in.