help deciding on which grass.

[TXMike]

I have 2 one acre pastures that I put my bull in after my cows drop calves and let my cows in from time to time. I sprayed and disked one pasture and planted rye grass because it was getting so overgrown with weeds. I planned on planting Tifton 85 in at least the one pasture this spring. The closer spring gets the more I don't know if im making a mistake. Some people tell me the Tifton is the way to go because if im gonna spend the money I might as well get the best. I thought about jiggs but its pretty much the same amount of work as Tifton, I have had people tell me that we get enough rain here that they thought jiggs would be better. I also thought about seeding Ranchero Frio but its $225 a bag so im not sure how much cheaper its gonna be than Tifton to start.

I didn't start thinking about going to the seeded until I saw how deep you have to plant the sprigs. Nobody will come plant such a small area even if I had them do both pastures. I have a disc and I can get a cultipacker but im not sure if I can get the sprigs 2 inches deep and worry about tearing them up so bad they wont grow. Is this a legitimate concern? thanks.

 

[Caustic Burno]

I have 2 one acre pastures that I put my bull in after my cows drop calves and let my cows in from time to time. I sprayed and disked one pasture and planted rye grass because it was getting so overgrown with weeds. I planned on planting Tifton 85 in at least the one pasture this spring. The closer spring gets the more I don't know if im making a mistake. Some people tell me the Tifton is the way to go because if im gonna spend the money I might as well get the best. I thought about jiggs but its pretty much the same amount of work as Tifton, I have had people tell me that we get enough rain here that they thought jiggs would be better. I also thought about seeding Ranchero Frio but its $225 a bag so im not sure how much cheaper its gonna be than Tifton to start.

I didn't start thinking about going to the seeded until I saw how deep you have to plant the sprigs. Nobody will come plant such a small area even if I had them do both pastures. I have a disc and I can get a cultipacker but im not sure if I can get the sprigs 2 inches deep and worry about tearing them up so bad they wont grow. Is this a legitimate concern? thanks.

Through the years I have planted and paid the stupid tax on about any kind of grass that will grow in Texas.
I finally learned to roll with Ma Nature and what she likes. Here the ole gal loves Bahia as well as I.
You can sprig coastal or most any other with a disc and disc the sprigs in. Before I planted it I would want to know what grew with the least attention. As I have always said if the cows can't make it on my hay and grass I am getting a better cow.

 

[B&M Farms]

You can plant any Bermuda with just a disk. Disk the ground up real well spread the sprigs and drop your disk all the way and disk in. The depth has never been a big deal for me. You can come back and drag the ground to smooth out the disc furs if you want. I always compact after that but if you get a timely rain and its not too dry, compacting isn't needed.
I wouldn't waste my time and money planting any kind of Bermuda seed because most hybrids will yield almost twice as much grass per acre.
Caustic has a point though. If you don't keep the nitrogen levels high enough in the soil Bahia will produce just as much grass.

 

[greybeard]

Tifton85 and Jiggs are about the same amount of work and have nearly the same growth rate, but in the same soil types and fertilized the same, the edge goes to Tifton in nutrition values according to:
http://www.texasfarmbureau.org/texasagr ... fton85.htm

I've got a family member that rolls about 400 bales of Jiggs/year down in Crosby and he told me if he had it to over, he wouldn't have gone with Jiggs. Said it plays out after about 4 years no matter what and he's had to re-establish it twice since he's been in the family. He's in that gumbo land tho--you may be more sandy loam there on the Prairie. One thing about the Jiggs I've seen around here--it will grow in standing water. IMO, Tifton does a better job in drought years--not as good as bahia but better than coastal.

 

[TXMike]

Yea I've got sandy loam soil, and it had Bahia growing on it. I think I'm gonna just go with the tifton 85 and just see how it plays out if not I may try one of the fancy Bahias like the tifton 9 or maybe the tifquick and put some clover in with it The main thing I wanna do is keep my bull fat and happy before he gets turned loose on the cows. I have water in both the pastures and they're small enough I could put a couple sprinklers in there to keep the ground wet. So rain shouldn't be to much of an issue trying to establish the tifton.

 

[TexasBred]

You'll end up with a pasture full of bahia eventually no matter which way you go.

 

[Caustic Burno]

You'll end up with a pasture full of bahia eventually no matter which way you go.

Exactly as I know the area.
Easier to roll with mother nature than fight her cause she is going to win.

 

[hurleyjd]

I suspect if you babied the Bahia as you do the hybrid Bermudas you would make a lot of tonnage of pretty good hay.

 

[B&M Farms]

I suspect if you babied the Bahia as you do the hybrid Bermudas you would make a lot of tonnage of pretty good hay.

Not even close. On tonnage and quality.

 

[TXMike]

I'm just curious which Bahia y'all think is going to have the best results?

 

[M5farm]

I am reworking a 4 acre patch this year it has common Bermuda and Bahia. It was grazed short and I fell in with the bottom plow and turned it as deep as I could. You can see the roots from the Bermuda sticking up. I have been letting it lay and in a few weeks I will disk and level it. when spring comes I am going to drill pearl millet. common Bermuda loves to be disturbed and it will flourish. especially if it thinks your trying to kill it.

 

[TexasBred]

I suspect if you babied the Bahia as you do the hybrid Bermudas you would make a lot of tonnage of pretty good hay.

Not even close. On tonnage and quality.

Not sure about that. Have seen some pretty sorry coastal hay in East Texas as well as other places. Too many folks let it go well past prime before cutting it. Would rather have lotz of hay than good hay.

 

[Pineland]

Bahia taps out a many of folks here in East Texas trying to beat it. Some can, but most cant. I learned to embrace it. It does extremely well in our bottoms.

 

[Caustic Burno]

I'm just curious which Bahia y'all think is going to have the best results?

99.99999999999999% of East Texas is Argentina the rest is Pensacola with a little Paraguay.
Paraguay is the best IMO you can't afford the seed and the Argentina is going to win anyway.

 

[hurleyjd]

http://forages.tamu.edu/PDF/scs2001-12.pdf

 

[Caustic Burno]

http://forages.tamu.edu/PDF/scs2001-12.pdf

Good read interesting on the Paraguay performing better in the Woodville -Jasper area.
When I was still baling hay one of the best fields I leased was Paraguay be so thick you would have to cut it in low gear range.
It produced right with a coastal field I had leased. Cows preferred it over the coastal.

 

[greybeard]

That too. Put out a bale of coastal, one of Jiggs, and one of Bahia and the cows will stay on the Bahia till it's gone before getting into the others. Dunno why except that's what they eat here during the growing season-Pcola bahia.

 

[B&M Farms]

I suspect if you babied the Bahia as you do the hybrid Bermudas you would make a lot of tonnage of pretty good hay.

Not even close. On tonnage and quality.

Not sure about that. Have seen some pretty sorry coastal hay in East Texas as well as other places. Too many folks let it go well past prime before cutting it. Would rather have lotz of hay than good hay.

He said babied. There is no reason to baby Bahia. I've been making 14%+ Bermuda hay for a while in east texas but its cut every three weeks and gets 40 lbs of nitrogen between cuttings plus 3 tons of chicken manure every other year. I do not feed this hay to my cows. This hay gets square baled and sold to city folks with horses. My cows eat a lesser quality hay and some of it is Bahia. Babied, Bahia will not come close to the yields or quality of Bermuda grass. If your not going to help it along stick with Bahia.

 

[TexasBred]

Not sure about that. Have seen some pretty sorry coastal hay in East Texas as well as other places. Too many folks let it go well past prime before cutting it. Would rather have lotz of hay than good hay.

He said babied. There is no reason to baby Bahia. I've been making 14%+ Bermuda hay for a while in east texas but its cut every three weeks and gets 40 lbs of nitrogen between cuttings plus 3 tons of chicken manure every other year. I do not feed this hay to my cows. This hay gets square baled and sold to city folks with horses. My cows eat a lesser quality hay and some of it is Bahia. Babied, Bahia will not come close to the yields or quality of Bermuda grass. If your not going to help it along stick with Bahia.[/quote]

I think that is more or less what I said. I never mentioned "babied". You sir are doing a lot of things correctly. Many don't so they end up with hay that is little more than filler regardless of the variety of grass being baled and fed. As I said "They prefer lotz of hay over quality hay".

 

[TXMike]

I was positive I was gonna go with tifton 9 bahia because it was going to be so easy to plant but now I'm back on the fence... And now I'm thinking jiggs over tifton 85. I talked to a couple guys that said if I planted jiggs it's the fastest spreading and I mentioned I was planning on using the 1 acre as a nursery when the cows were all in the back and they all said jiggs would be the easiest to plant from tops. I also did a little big of research and from what I've seen jiggs is only a couple points behind tifton 85 in everything.

What is making me second guess going with the tifton 9 is it cross pollinating. There's gonna be some seeds in the ground and some is gonna pop back up in the spring. I plan on spraying again to kill it back then discing again but I'm sure more will pop back up and then the tifton 9 will eventually revert back to Pensacola from cross pollinating from any that might pop up again or that's growing around the pasture.