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Winter or spring barley?
- Thread starter Beefsmith
- Start date
deleted user 837354
Member
Which grass weeds? Buy a plough.
Oooh tin of worms
Well spring because you have no options really in winter
So how are you going to vary your rotation to include the percentage of spring crops that are apparently required for DD to work successfully?
Allegedly.
I don’t get where that has come from to be honest.
lots of spring cropping here for the last 6 years has now created spring germinating blackgrass.
Spring barley seems to be the one crop which we struggle with some years in DD, everything else yields the same or better.
- Location
- North West
We’re not direct drilling but get some cracking cover crops between harvesting and drilling winter barley.
As for the OP’s question, on a good year spring barley will hands down have the best margin and can yield as much as winter barley. However on a bad year it will take money with it! If winter barley gets a good establishment it will be a far more consistent yield year on year.
Will just have S Beans if I can get away with it
What operation are you doing there? Straight in with a power harrow through an unsprayed cover crop?We’re not direct drilling but get some cracking cover crops between harvesting and drilling winter barley.
As for the OP’s question, on a good year spring barley will hands down have the best margin and can yield as much as winter barley. However on a bad year it will take money with it! If winter barley gets a good establishment it will be a far more consistent yield year on year.
- Location
- North West
Chopping it with the short discs, plough it in then combi drill, some ground we do spray it off chop it then straight in with the drill though.
With the price of glypho at the moment there’s not much difference between a pass with the sprayer and a pass with the plough
Not criticising but that seems a lot of operations to this backward mixed farmer. We’re constantly being told that ploughing and combi drilling will undoubtedly bring about the end of civilisation by 2050. It brought about consistent excellent crops here but what do I know. We’re edging away from the plough and are experimenting with tined cultivator instead of ploughing of stubble (looking ok as a policy in our 2nd year of it). One experimental field direct drilled with a Claydon was just comical in its lack of any noticeable crop.Chopping it with the short discs, plough it in then combi drill, some ground we do spray it off chop it then straight in with the drill though.
With the price of glypho at the moment there’s not much difference between a pass with the sprayer and a pass with the plough
To see someone doing an extra operation on top of the evil plough has come as a surprise. I’m fascinated as to how you guys growing these bulky cover crops deal with the bulk. (can I stress I’m not criticising again btw). You’ve obv found that a plough as a middle operation is necessary but to me that looks as if your short discs are doing a terrific job of dealing with the cover. I’d be happy to go in with the combi drill looking at that. Presumably, the dark colour of the soil is hiding a lot of material which becomes apparent when you drill?
- Location
- North West
Generally we will have a crop established with no more than 3 passes maximum (personally I would have just drilled into that as well but I have to keep the old boy happy who loves a bit of ploughing
). Some ground we just go with a one pass cultivator then drill and maybe plough one in 3 years maybe. The cultivator doesn’t like a lot of trash so can’t go straight into a cover crop with it! It took some time to get the old boy away from working stubbles then another pass before the plough then powerharrow before the combi 
So, on the grand scheme we now have a pretty efficient system in comparison .I don’t care what anyone says, some ground doesn’t suit direct drilling! However chopping straw and cover crops are definitely improving it.
For the sake of clarity, when you say combi drill are you talking about a drill mounted on top of a powerharrow? That’s what rednecks like me understand by combidrill.Generally we will have a crop established with no more than 3 passes maximum (personally I would have just drilled into that as well but I have to keep the old boy happy who loves a bit of ploughing
I don’t care what anyone says, some ground doesn’t suit direct drilling! However chopping straw and cover crops are definitely improving it.
- Location
- North West
Looks a nice cover, what’s in it ?We’re not direct drilling but get some cracking cover crops between harvesting and drilling winter barley.
As for the OP’s question, on a good year spring barley will hands down have the best margin and can yield as much as winter barley. However on a bad year it will take money with it! If winter barley gets a good establishment it will be a far more consistent yield year on year.
- Location
- North West
I added some vetch and rye to pad it out and the crimson clover was swapped to berseem clover as it’s faster growing
So was drilled at 10kg/ha + 10kg/ha of vetch/rye.
The over winter covers did really well too, same mix but retained the crimson clover. Also got 10t of fym added to the mix.
- Location
- Bedfordshire
If you are growing SBly for BG control FFS drill in April, and don't bother with a pre em.
I said years ago that BG will select for spring germination during a run of spring crops. The concept was poo pooed at the time but I have since been proved correct. BG will never be resistant to steel and diesel though.
I said years ago that BG will select for spring germination during a run of spring crops. The concept was poo pooed at the time but I have since been proved correct. BG will never be resistant to steel and diesel though.
It kind of is because we have laughed ryegrass down only to bring some ups from below at the same time. The only way steel would beat is it you ran a shallow cultivator every time you have a germination of grass weeds which would mean not actually planting a crop in that year.
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Spring. Plough it and level it in autumn. Spray off, all fert on, drill straight in.