This will only be the third year I've done food plots, and mine are pretty small at 1/2 acre each. I have never planted any brassicas but would like to this year and wanted to know which one would be best for pretty rocky ridge top soil? Should I blend it with wheat? I also guess that I need to get it out pretty soon too right? I'll be doing the spray/throw/mow method.
Food Plots I would like to plant brassicas
- Thread starter poorhunter
- Start date
double browtine
Well-Known Member
I'll be doing the same thing. I have a couple of plots in the woods. I am going to plant a mixture of buck forage oats, winter wheat, some turnip greens and an old bag of annual clover mix. The man thing is you are going to add plenty of fertilizer. Some fertilizer when you plant and some more about a month later.
DoubleRidge
Well-Known Member
I've had barasicas in store blends before but this year we wanted to plant our smaller plots which are 1/4 acre to 1/2 acre in all barasicas....we bush hogged plots first of July then allowed them to grow back up to about a foot tall....then sprayed and sowed.....once brown, with a good heavy rain, the grass and young weeds will lay down over the seed....we purchased our barasicas seed and made our own blend of Tilliage Radish, Purple Top Turnip and Dwarf Rape.....after germination we will review each plot and fill in any thin areas with winter wheat or cereal rye....also, being spray and sow, we know that we won't get seed to soil contact with all the seed so we upped the seed rate a little...but don't overseed too much...they say barasicas that are overcrowded won't grow well....my experience in the past with blends which contained barasicas...where there was moisture they grow good and get to a nice size..dryer spots they grew but never got any size....so be prepared to back them up with wheat or cereal rye...good luck.
What fertilizer? Just 10-10-10? I haven't done a soil test and probably won't. I know that I won't get optimum yield, but I'm just wanting a spot to keep some deer on my place longer. There's a huge lease that my property backs up, to and they plant a lot and it's tough to compete.
JCDEERMAN
Well-Known Member
Right on!
JCDEERMAN
Well-Known Member
They hammered our cereal rye last year when everything else had been eaten up. It was lush green and deer were in there day and night. Just another option of seed to "filling in the gaps" where the brassicas are lacking where you've sowed. It is very cold tolerant.
I almost always blend purple top turnips, tillage radish (daikon) and cereal rye at 1 lb, 2 lb, 70 lb for drilling but like said above if spreading take it up a notch on the cereal grain maybe 100 lb per. In throw and grow a lot of seed won't make good contact with the soil. That's why it should be increased. Use turnips instead of just greens, the bulb is pure carbs and after a freeze turns to augers and they will eat them up. The cereal grains will also provide continued cover crop and food thru the winter, weed suppression in spring and food for rabbits and turkey when it seeds out.
Plant the blend, wheat is cheap, rye is a great option for a little more
Planting that blend including the annual clovers this week in some hidey hole plots
Plant the blend, wheat is cheap, rye is a great option for a little more
Planting that blend including the annual clovers this week in some hidey hole plots
I'm not a fan of pre mixed seed blends. With that said my vest brassica I ever planted was biologic maxim. They loved it.
double browtine
Well-Known Member
Most mixes say to use 19-19-19 at a rate of 300lbs. Per acre. So that would be 3 50lb. bags per 1/2 acre
BSK
Well-Known Member
The standard practice for broadcast throw-and-mow seeding is to increase the recommended seeding rate (which is for drilled seed) by 50%. So for a cereal grain alone with a recommended seeding rate is 100 lbs per acre, broadcast for throw-and-mow at 150 lbs per acre. This practice has worked great for me for many years.
I always believe (if it ain't broke don't fix it)!
I reduce percentages when blending. Especially when including brassicas. I like really big leaves and turnips and reducing percentages allows a little room for development and is a recognized process. I actually have not read much on percentages exclusively for throw and grow but I like your increase in those cases.
BSK
Well-Known Member
Old rule is, when mixing more than one species: cut the seeding rate for each species by 1/3 when mixing two species. Cut the seeding rate for each by half when mixing three or more species. And then if broadcasting for throw-and-mow increase each by 50%.
DoubleRidge
Well-Known Member
Reading this "old rule" makes me feel some better because before this year we've never done a pure barasica plot before....so per the QDMA article I referenced it gave pure stand recommendations by seed type for Turnip, Rape, Radish, etc....so making a 3 seed blend then cutting recommended rate per seed type by 1/2...that puts you at 12lb per acre for our blend.....but with the 50% increase recommendation (for throw and mow) that put us at a 18lb per acre recommendation....just ran our numbers for what we sowed Saturday and we hit a little high at 19lb per acre of Radish, Rape and Turnip blend using the spray, sow and mow just before a rain method.....hoping it's not too much to stunt the leafy growth?....if so and there are thin areas we'll fill in with cereal rye or winter wheat as needed...we'll see.
BSK
Well-Known Member
Just remember that with throw-and-mow you're probably only getting 60-70% germination. So that extra seed is simply to make sure you have an adequate stand.
BSK
Well-Known Member
Also remember that seeding rates are based on getting plants to full maturity without plant removal. Deer are constantly removing plants through eating, hence it's OK to overseed by a certain percentage. Basically, deer can take care of a lot of plant overcrowding issues!
DoubleRidge
Well-Known Member
Excellent point!
BSK
Well-Known Member
We will see with our increased acreage in plots, but in past years, with fewer acres and during an acorn failure, not a single plant in my plots got anywhere near maturity before they were eaten to the dirt!
JCDEERMAN
Well-Known Member
That's what I was going to point out. Back when I first started planting soybeans, I was picking them up from a fine gentlemen here on TNDEER and I asked if drilling a certain amount of them would be too heavy and he said, "the deer will take care of that problem for you". That's always stuck with me. You can crowd out with some blends, but most will do ok
348Winchester
Well-Known Member
Clover, peas, and chicory have always worked well when blended with brassicas. It seems that cereal grains would out compete brassicas for available nitrogen.
DoubleRidge
Well-Known Member
Numerous sources say the same thing....in particular cereal rye is better to be planted separate from barrasica....or at least plant your barasicas several weeks ahead of the cereal grains to give them a head start and too prevent them from being smothered out by the rye.....this is the first year that we've planted our smaller plots in all barrasica...turnip, radish and rape.... anxious to see how they do...we're going to wait several weeks and if there are any thin areas we'll fill in with winter wheat.....doing the larger plots in cereal rye and may mix in some clover.
