Anyone ever grown oats in the fescue belt? Given the shortage, high price of fertilizer, etc., I'm considering sowing some this spring. I can sell any I don't need to the feed mill.
I believe you are still going to need fertilizer. We used to grow them as a cover crop and a nurse crop after we grew tobacco and was going back to grass. Always cut for hay because nobody here had a combine. Always small acres though.
Same here in the central Kentucky bluegrass (really fescue) region. 50 years ago spring oats were a common nurse crop for tobacco fields going back to grass. We always made hay from them but if not planted early enough they never got very tall. Winter wheat replaced oats for this purpose for the most part.
Sometimes I would fall seed winter rye (grain) and frost seed it with clover. In a good season some very good gains would be made in the spring with young weaned calves. We just grazed it down and let the young grass and clover establish itself.
