What are the benefits of growing triticale?

[jackrussell101]

Arable novice here.

What are the benefits of growing triticale in an arable rotation?

Is it a breakcrop with wheat?

How cheap is it to grow, and what yield would you expect from land that would normally do 3.5 tonne per acre wheat?

Presumably combined, and the straw is of use too?

Many thanks

 

[average farmer]

Grown it as whole crop and combine, concluded not any benefit over wheat on wheat land .

 

[farmbrew]

It is considerably cheaper to grow. It generally sells for a bit less. Volunteers can be a pain and harvest is a bit more work regarding threshing and extra straw. More drought resistant and disease resistant. Rabbits don't like it as much as wheat either.

 

[Brisel]

Better on lighter drought prone land than normal wheat. As above, it sells at a discount to feed wheat.

 

[spin cycle]

b'strd to get to tiller IME

 

[BrianV]

It's alright, not so productive as barley, good length stiff straw, rabbit proof, fairly disease free, seed can't be saved & used again, have had it fail to produce any grain once a few years ago after growing it for several years & decided not to risk it again.

 

[ollie989898]

Triticale is 'disease free'- yeah, can I get that in writing?

Does not like being sown into muck, does not like being sown late into muck. Wants to be put in early, into a good seed bed and given plenty of time to establish before winter sets in.

Will need spraying for disease.

 

[ploughman1963]

Ideal if you have sheep as you can graze it to death in the winter and it will still recover - added benefit that it then needs less straw shortener

 

[HarryB97]

First year growing it here so will let you no once it’s cut. So far though it looks very promising, might replace winter barley with it as it normally disappoints!

 

[Simon Chiles]

Arable novice here.

What are the benefits of growing triticale in an arable rotation?

Is it a breakcrop with wheat?

How cheap is it to grow, and what yield would you expect from land that would normally do 3.5 tonne per acre wheat?

Presumably combined, and the straw is of use too?

Many thanks

On the plus side it requires less N, less fungicide, tolerates drought and wet better than wheat. If you’re feeding to your own stock you’ll get better weight gain than you would with wheat and if you’re feeding it to cattle you can feed it in barley type quantities as it doesn’t cause acidosis. It’ll grow taller than wheat but is less likely to fall over, yield is about the same, maybe slightly less than wheat. Although tall I’d say the straw yield was equivalent to wheat.
The negative side is that it’s very under rated so unless you’ve got a market it’s very difficult to sell, often trading at a reasonable discount to wheat. In the old days it used to be possible to grow it without a fungicide but now it’s more likely to get yellow rust, I’d give it a strob and teb. As mentioned above it’s shy to tiller, early N and a robust PGR will solve that. It’s generally better not to sow it too early in the Autumn, last year’s kind back end means mine is past 3rd node already so I’d expect to be at ear emergence in a couple of weeks, not so good it we get a late frost as it can cause blind bits on the ears. Although I have experienced it in the past I wouldn’t imagine that it had affected yield by more than 1%, but there’s always a first time. Some say it’s prone to ergot but I’ve never had a problem with it.
Personally I think it’s underrated but until a market for it is sorted I would imagine that it’s going to remain so.

 

[ploughman1963]

Friend of mine who was in pigs grew a lot of it - feed as good as wheat and oodles of straw- I used to do his baling and whilst it was a fair trip it was always a profitable one.
I wasn’t aware that seed couldn’t be saved? (Mentioned earlier)

 

[snipe]

can get ergot in it. We grew spring triticale. Good for blackgrass control. Same cost as spring barley slightly more yield.

 

[ajd132]

In terms of herbicide I think it’s pretty much the same as wheat? Can’t see it on liberator label but can see it on various generic flufen and pendi products. Avadex?

 

[Great In Grass]

Amongst others I have sold Armarillo from Soya UK their agronomy advice is;

Agronomy for Amarillo

Sowing date: October - April
Seed Rate: 75kg/acre (185kg/Ha)
N-Fertiliser: Autumn 40kg/Ha
(Autumn sown input) Tillering 80kg/Ha
Shooting 20kg/Ha
Late dose 40kg/Ha

Plant height: Medium to high
Standing power: Medium
Disease resistance: Yellow rust high
Brown rust very high
Leaf septoria high
Ear septoria very high
Ear fusarium high to very high

Fungicides: Depending on disease pressure, a general purpose fungicide is used after ear emergence. Epoxiconazole, Azoxystrobin and others are commonly used.

Herbicides: No known sensitivity to standard herbicides. Stomp, Topic, Ally and various others are all commonly used.

Growth Regulator Moddus, Chlormequat and Terpal are all commonly used. The most effective stage is at GS30 (Early stem elongation) Growth regulator is essential where growers apply full rates of Nitrogen.

Note:
The above agronomy applies to straight crops of Amarillo only. Where flexi-mix is grown (Amarillo with winter vetch), the agronomy and chemical choice is different.

 

[Brisel]

Looks like good advice but dated - epoxi was withdrawn a while ago.

For those of you who grow triticale, where do you put it in the rotation? Second cereal? Is it any better for methane gas yield in an AD plant than forage rye?

 

[ploughman1963]

Looks like good advice but dated - epoxi was withdrawn a while ago.

For those of you who grow triticale, where do you put it in the rotation? Second cereal? Is it any better for methane gas yield in an AD plant than forage rye?

We have used it as 3rd cereal as a lower risk than wheat where we have been re-aligning a rotation

 

[Simon Chiles]

Looks like good advice but dated - epoxi was withdrawn a while ago.

For those of you who grow triticale, where do you put it in the rotation? Second cereal? Is it any better for methane gas yield in an AD plant than forage rye?

It’s in the first cereal after a break for me because I’m growing it for seed.

 

[An Gof]

All of what has been said plus IT SPROUTS in the ear in a wet harvest (rye parentage)
Good crop if you intend to crimp it and feed it all yourself.

 

[ajd132]

What is like for maturity compared to rye? Is it earlier or later?

 

[Daniel]

Growing it as a 2nd cereal this year in place of rye. Rye did well last year but it’s quite low protein at about 9% so requires extra soya meal and oil to balance it in a poultry ration, which is currently expensive.

Triticale should be higher protein and it mainly looks good It didn’t establish too well in places where we chopped the straw, there was a lot of it, our combines straw chopper left the straw too long, and the Claydon bunched it up in places.

Going to try serrated knives in the chopper this year to see if it gives a shorter cut, think with the early harvest last year the straw wasn’t as ripe as the grain and didn’t chop easily, failing that, bale it.