free hayground is too expensive

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If you dont know what you need then its easy to say Chicken Shyt is cheaper . Applying a standard blend fertilizer can be expensive but if you want to achieve the maximum production your going to have to use a blend tailored to you lands needs.

Litter can help build the soil but is far from being what you need . count your blessing that you don't have land rent on top of the fertilizer bill.
 
littletom by the truck load. m5 ive been soil testing and mixing ammonuim nitrate, dap and 0-0-60 and its still costing over 100 dollars a year if i put 2/3's of what it calls for on it. all im saying is why wouldnt i rent and save enough money using chicken litter to pay the rent then i can add whats lacking after the litter with commercial. if i rented i could have diecent size fields and it would save me alot of road time. but i am thankful for what free ones ive got
 
I understand that its hard to justify exactly what a soil test calls for but facts are facts and if your soil need it you have to do what is needed to make sure the soil produces its potential. at a 100 an acre and your said you make squares thats only a 1.00 per bale
 
SDM said:
JMJ Farms said:
Here, I pay $30/ac and generally spend about $400/ac per year on fertilizer. Would cost about $90/ac to put 2 tons/ac of litter. Question. With commercial fertilizer I usually put 3 applications. Usually something like 120/75/120 then 120/0/120 and then 100/0/0. How much litter would I have to put to achieve the same results?
Is that bermudagrass or similar? 340 units of N seems like a lot.

Yep. Bermudagrass. Most of it is Alicia. Which is my least favorite. I'd rather have Russell or Coastal. Or even better Tift85. But they are rented fields so I will have to go with what I've got. It is a lot of N. But I fertilize as close as possible to soil tests and try to put back what I take out. With decent rainfall I also yield about 6 tons/ac/yr. so just say roughly $420/ac/yr divided by 12 rolls/ac/yr = $35/bale + $20/bale to roll it = $55/bale. Which is high, but it's also real good hay. Wish I knew another way.
 
I don't see a lot of planted bermudagrass here, mostly fescue which doesn't need maybe half of that. There is a fair amount of volunteer wiregrass and though.
 
A ton of 16% protein hay has 51.2 pounds of N in it. A ton of 10% protein has 32 pounds of N. It is pretty easy to calculate how much N is utilized and removed. 2,000 pounds times % of protein divided by 6.25 will give you the answer. There is a little more N used by the plants than will show up in that equation but not very much more.
 
also my understanding on spreading nitrogen is your CEC cation exchange capacity X 10 is the amount of nitrogen the ground can absorb at one time. for example your cec is 7, anything more than 70 pounds of nitrogen would be lost. that may be BS but thats what i was going by when i spread ammonium nitrate
 
MtnCows93 why on earth dont i just rent hayland ($30 to $50 an acre) and put chicken litter on it which costs me $40 an acre and makes the grass grow way better [/quote said:
Location?
Tradition?
Challenge?

Ain't nothing free when buying in fertility.
 
Stocker Steve said:
Dave It is pretty easy to calculate how much N is utilized and removed. 2 said:
Ya
but
How much N is the soil biology generating?

Some climates and soils it can be significant. Others it is nothing at all. Some with a history of manure application will have the residual affect of manure slowly breaking down. There is a whole lot of difference that will vary a lot depending on a lot of different circumstances. That calculation just tells you how much N was utilized. Where it came from is a different story.
 
MtnCows93 said:
also my understanding on spreading nitrogen is your CEC cation exchange capacity X 10 is the amount of nitrogen the ground can absorb at one time. for example your cec is 7, anything more than 70 pounds of nitrogen would be lost. that may be BS but thats what i was going by when i spread ammonium nitrate

Cation exchange capacity (CEC) is the ability of your soil to hold cations (Potassium, Calcium, Magnesium, etc). This is the first time I ever hear of it being used to calculate Nitrogen applications. And I can't think of a reason that it would be used for that purpose. CEC is used in calculating the affects of liming has on soil pH.
 

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