Why does it look so much better now than your previous visits? That wheat and rye are doing their work building the soil and controlling weeds.
I'd go late Aug with WR, oats, peas, RC. You can throw in half WW/WR if you'd rather. Frost seed WC early spring. Ph and soil readings to determine needs before planting will help.
Or we can talk letting it go native and save money on seed. Good luck. Great looking field.
I think it looks better to me now because I wasn’t expecting the wheat to make it through the winter. When I checked the plot earlier this year, I didn’t realize that the plot was still 50% wheat. The wheat was much shorter than the rye, making me think half of the rye was doing poorly.
Now I see that both the rye and wheat did what they were supposed to do, and I have a pretty thick plot of what is great nesting and bedding cover, waiting to become organic matter in a new plot. Additionally, there’s lots of grain seed waiting to be consumed, or to reseed for the next cycle of this plot.
If I mow the plot around Labor Day, I’m concerned that it would be too late in the year for any substantial growth for anything other than WR. From what I can tell, I’m in zone 4b.
So my question at this point-
1) Broadcast clover seed around Labor day, and mow the current crop of WW/WR on top with the idea that the WW/WR seed from the 2019 crop will germinate and regrow, with a mowing of the new WR/WW to release clover.
or
2) Leave the current crop,of WR/WR standing through the winter, with the idea that it will get knocked down, allowing the seed to get eaten, and then frost seeding clover in 2020.
At this point I’m leaning towards leaving it, and letting Mother Nature to do its thing with the current crop. I don’t believe the deer are going to eat the grain, but it might become available to Turkey if the plants get knocked down.
I just had the plot cleared by a dozer in 2017, it was thorn apple and prickly ash prior to that. I don’t think I’m interested in letting it go back to native because it’s just going to revert to prickly ash again, and I’m hoping to add to available winter food for the deer, and probably use it to hunt over at some point.
Thanks for all your input.
Rusty
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