planting hay question

[jason, NW Ontario]

How many species do you plant together?
I'm just a tiny hobby farm, feeding both horses and sheep. We both currently have f/t jobs, and mine keeps me away from the property on 7/7 shifts. I do my best to harvest as much as I can in optimum heading-out, but different species mature at different times. Depending on what our soil sample tells us, I'm playing around with using 4 different species to hedge my bets.
How many species do you combine when planting?

 

[Charlie M]

When I plant I am trying to establish a timothy field for horse people. I plant a clover/timothy mix. I get about one year from the clover and end up with a nice timothy field if all has gone well. What you plant should have some bearing to what you are doing with the hay, drainage and soil conditions.

 

[kyhayman]

A little wrong hurts more than mostly right helps..... I try to plant no more than one grass and one legume species together.

I've got one field that had timothy with late maturity and orchard grass with early maturity both planted together when I bought the farm. What happens is if I cut the orchard grass right I get a half yield since the timothy is just barely starting to elongate. If I wait on the timothy then the orchard grass is dry and brown.

 

[showcrop]

I agree with what the others have said. Location and climate have a lot to do with it. In my area legumes can be very tough to dry down if there is moisture in the soil or in the air, but the protein and N fixing are very desirable. I see no advantage to timothy unless you are selling it. It is not advantageous to the animals, only the owners. Orchard grass will actually test higher, everything else being equal.

 

[Ken Macfarlane]

Around here triple mix is common, timothy clover and orchard. There is no problem with timing as it is always too wet to harvest at the correct date for any of them. I'm considering planting some single species as the straight timothy fields appear to be more resistant to weed infestation and clover messes with dry down in late second cut.

 

[randallnMo]

From a nutritional standpoint, a mixed stand of legumes and grasses is desirable. Usually, one of each. From a weed control standpoint, a single legume or grass is the best. You can control weeds in a straight grass stand, and you can do the same in a straight legume stand. When you mix the two, you're basicly left with no options for weed control. Weed control comes into play as the stand ages. Straight grass stands fertilized heavily provide the best weed control in and of themselves. The drawback to grass is its lower yields overall. Legumes out yield grass almost two to one....possibly more. Mixed stands of grass have maturity issues that often are not compatible. Thus, my opinion is to sow a single species grass along with a legume of choice. AS the legume starts to dwindle, you can interseed additional legumes or start fertilizing with more N and rely upon the old stand by 2-4d.

 

[jackinok]

my opinion for what its worth.I think in your case i would look at more HOW i feed as opposed to WHAT i feed.Makes a lot of difference.Is this field going to be a straight hay field?a pasture?or a field thats grazed and the excess baled?best way for a feild thats grazed,is to have a mixture of plants that do well in your area.Pick a legume of some type that puts on growth early and late ,and grass(es) that gives you more summer grazing.Bale early and late in the year when clovers and things are doing well and graze during summer when grasses are activly growing and have their best nutritional value.If this is to be strictly a hay feild for winter feed,and nothing else,alfalfa is a good choice.It makes good quality hay ,and if you keep your animals up in a lot,you can, by the right feeding program adjust your feed fairly easily,to what ever is best for your animals.Even sort of custom feed each individual animal if need be.The good thing about alfalfa is it tends to be fairly consistent and allows you to do this,where a mixed hay is more of a guessing game because quality will vary,sometimes even from one end of bale to the other.this is why horse folks tend to want a hay with either a single plant or just one or two types of things in the mix.A browser such as sheep,goats etc,would do better often times with a hay that has a far more variety in the mix.basically, if you pasture animals you want a mix,if you stable or pen animals you want a straight high quality grass or legume hay, and add whats lacking with supplements.personally i RARELY feed a straight hay.but i feed very little hay at all most years if any.I run mostly on native grass,which has some thing growing pretty much year round.i only feed in the very worst weather,but im way south also.back when i kept horses they grazed on the same pasture as other animals,and I dont recall ever having a problem from it.of course when working horses i fed them also,they would be brought in from field,taken care of and fed a grain of some type,and turned out to graze at night or late evening and the next day ,since we rarely worked the same team two days in a row unless we had to.last working horse i had lived to be 37 before i put her down,and was born and spent her life on the place.

 

[jason, NW Ontario]

Thanks for all the input. We're looking at strictly hay fields right now, and alfalfa is the legume of choice. Orchard grass, brome and maybe timothy are the species we're considering. We might throw out the idea of the timothy, and then debate the merits of the other two grasses. Something else that I hadn't thought of until just now is the size of seeds - it would probably be best if seed size was close for even distribution in the hoppers. We've got an IH #10 drill and will use a packer behind it.

Jay

 

[jackinok]

got fertilizer or grass bins on it? lots of multi species feilds have been planted by putting say,alfalfa seed in grass bins,a larger seed in the grain bins,and another seed with a carrier in the fertilizer boxes. if not and dont have grass bins or fert most old drill could put fertilizer in the same row as seed,this would let you say plant a grass seed mixed with your fertilizer with nitrogen for a starter out of your regular bin,above that on another pass you could plant afalfa with another fertilizer thats low on nitrogen.lots of ways of doing it,i would though if you in any way could suggest a packer,even with press wheels.

 

[jason, NW Ontario]

Our drill has grass, grain, and fertilizer bins, but the fert bin has been corroded a long time. Our old packer was originally the horse-drawn kind that's been converted: 9 ft wide and pretty darn heavy - should help a lot in our clay loam.

Jay

 

[Pacer 54]

Hey, Jason, With bromegrass make sure to use smooth brome not meadow brome. Meadow brome leaves have a hairy coating that translates to dust. Most people wouldn't mind but horse owners......

 

[jason, NW Ontario]

That's something I didn't know. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[jackinok]

ok,what i would do,put your alfalfa in grass boxes.mix very well whatever grass seed you intend to plant with fertilizer as a carrier in regular seed bin. pack first,drill as shallowly as you possably can,and remove tubes to grass boxes from openers and wire them so afalfa seed falls on ground between rows.use a balanced starter fertilizer for grass, which should drop in the rows with grass seed.when you work the ground mix in fertilizer if you are going to use any for alfalfa at that time,because you wont lose your nitrogen that way. either hook packer on behind drill or repack after planting.this will keep you from having your afalfa seed to deep if you get a heavy rain,before it can germinate.of course you could sow everything also,but by using your drill you can sort of reduce competition somewhat until plants get going a little.thats how lots of folks around here used to do it.