Grass OR muck for grain yield??

[teslacoils]

The guys we share one of the drills with also have a 12m stripper header which we use on oats and barley so fairly well set up for the job. Might be worth a revisit.

I like a bit of risk, but grass seed is a small step too far for me!

 

[Farmer Fin]

Why do you think growing cereals will be more profitable than growing grass on your ground? If you can get good grass growth and utilisation and covert that to efficient meat then your margin per ha may we’ll be better than cereals.

 

[AT Aloss]

The guys we share one of the drills with also have a 12m stripper header which we use on oats and barley so fairly well set up for the job. Might be worth a revisit.

Is it an RSD or a CVS? The torque is wrong on a CVS for grass seed & rice. After last autumn perhaps we should be thinking in terms of rice?

 

[Bossfarmer]

We have a mixed farm here. Crops are definitely better after a grass ley provided you have fed the grass ley when taking silage or hay off it. Grassland that’s given heavy crops of forage without replenishment of lime, potash and phosphate can become extremely poor. Muck also helps a lot.
It’s a lot of work and overhead though, running different enterprises. It was so simple and easy when it was just combinables. Never underestimate the amount of machinery livestock farming seems to need nowadays. It requires more kit than the arable, either owned or hired which makes me sceptical about folks cracking on about a return to dog and stick farming as a means of cutting expenses. If I was going lean and mean I’d direct drill cereals and leave the straw chopper switched on all the time. The livestock would go. A nice idea but a lot of work for marginally greater return if any. Maybe you do get another half ton per acre in the arable but you work for it.

Interesting, i have noticed extra yield after grass but as you say the cattle are a lot of work and costs and im tying up 500 acres of croppable ground, i would never want to loose the muck either perhaps im best just working away how i am?

 

[martian]

The problem we found with pure grass breaks was following with wheat, which never did that well...second wheat would be better, but frit fly or whatever would ensure first wheat was a bit rubbish. We're now trying four year herbal leys , lots of different roots in the soil, extracting nutrients from deep down and all over the place, feeding the soil all year round. Christine Jones talks about the 'liquid carbon pathway' where plants export as much as 60% of the sugars they create from photosynthesis into the soil, exchanged with fungi and bacteria for water and mineral nutrients...this is the great benefit of a multi-year perennial break. Mob-graze with cattle and the money flows (in which direction is up to you)

 

[AT Aloss]

Why do you think growing cereals will be more profitable than growing grass on your ground? If you can get good grass growth and utilisation and covert that to efficient meat then your margin per ha may we’ll be better than cereals.

That was the idea when plans went in a few years ago in this area at Nocton for a super dairy. It was a stunning idea that used the logic you suggest. But it got jumped on by the animal rights brigade & the nimbies and the planners chickened out. Progress is blighted in this country by the narrow minded.

 

[ollie989898]

Why do you think growing cereals will be more profitable than growing grass on your ground? If you can get good grass growth and utilisation and covert that to efficient meat then your margin per ha may we’ll be better than cereals.

Certainly if you have dairy cattle then it will be more profitable than cereals.

 

[AT Aloss]

The problem we found with pure grass breaks was following with wheat, which never did that well...second wheat would be better, but frit fly or whatever would ensure first wheat was a bit rubbish. We're now trying four year herbal leys , lots of different roots in the soil, extracting nutrients from deep down and all over the place, feeding the soil all year round. Christine Jones talks about the 'liquid carbon pathway' where plants export as much as 60% of the sugars they create from photosynthesis into the soil, exchanged with fungi and bacteria for water and mineral nutrients...this is the great benefit of a multi-year perennial break. Mob-graze with cattle and the money flows (in which direction is up to you)

I think you've hit the sweet spot with the herbal leys & why they work when pure grass breaks don't.

 

[ollie989898]

That was the idea when plans went in a few years ago in this area at Nocton for a super dairy. It was a stunning idea that got used the logic you suggest. But it got jumped on by the animal rights brigade & the nimbies and the planners chickened out. Progress is blighted in this country by the narrow minded.

If that number of stakedholders oppose such a plan, maybe it was best abandoned then? Why can't another livestock production model be used instead?

I've lived near a 1000+ plus dairy. The area stank of sh1t endlessly, the number of tractor movements was insane and the flies were basically a problem all summer.

 

[ollie989898]

I've put wheat in behind really really really bad permanent pasture many many times. There has to be a way of negating the frit fly risk. I've never seen a wheat crop destroyed by them.

 

[Farmer Fin]

That was the idea when plans went in a few years ago in this area at Nocton for a super dairy. It was a stunning idea that got used the logic you suggest. But it got jumped on by the animal rights brigade & the nimbies and the planners chickened out. Progress is blighted in this country by the narrow minded.

I’m think Nocton stoppped because milk price crashed and it was no longer feasible. Yes the antis had a lot to say about factory farming. Not quite sure what you are saying in your reply? My point was his bottom line may not improve by growing spring barley!

 

[Farmer Fin]

Certainly if you have dairy cattle then it will be more profitable than cereals.

Not always!

 

[ollie989898]

Not always!

It certainly should be!

 

[AT Aloss]

I've put wheat in behind really really really bad permanent pasture many many times. There has to be a way of negating the frit fly risk. I've never seen a wheat crop destroyed by them.

It is rarely destroyed, but the yield reduction (20% with insecticide, likely worse without) is a step in the wrong direction in achieving high yielding wheat, which I think was the original question

 

[AT Aloss]

If that number of stakedholders oppose such a plan, maybe it was best abandoned then? Why can't another livestock production model be used instead?

I've lived near a 1000+ plus dairy. The area stank of sh1t endlessly, the number of tractor movements was insane and the flies were basically a problem all summer.

It was in the middle of Nocton Fen and was a very sophisticated construction. I'm not sure it could have smelled a lot worse than the beet factory when it was on the go, but the point I was supporting was a change of cropping for the soil, and the idea of taking the livestock to their inputs rather than transporting the inputs to the livestock.

 

[Derrick Hughes]

I was wondering about introducing grass seed to the rotation. Obviously it’s not the same but would this help on a purely arable farm? We do import a lot of chicken manure and grow covers aswell.

Choose deep rootting grasses to bust up any pan

 

[AT Aloss]

Choose deep rootting grasses to bust up any pan

Festulolium is remarkable in that respect

 

[AT Aloss]

The grass extends the break. The muck adds the fertility. The grass also reduces the weeds. Wheat after longish grass did a ton to the acre more than mine, for less spend. Hence I now have grass. Trick is turning the grass into money but that's moving forward.

The other risk after a longer grass break is leatherjackets & in the past there has been control with insecticides, but alas no longer.

 

[teslacoils]

I will be following my grass with winter beans....when I finally get that far down the line.

 

[teslacoils]

The other risk after a longer grass break is leatherjackets & in the past there has been control with insecticides, but alas no longer.

I am working on four years max. Maybe three. Depends how the grass holds up.