Orchard Grass ?

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Stocker Steve

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I plant blends of grasses and legumes. Had been including a high percentage of meadow fescue but it does last. What I am seeing is an increase in the orchard grass as the stands get older. I think the cows avoid the seed stems and so it reproduced well. Folks claim OG winterkills in the north but I have not seen that.

How do you manage a paddock dominated by OG?
 
I'm a long ways from MN, but for us the OG doesn't stand up to grazing as well as fescue. It also doesn't provide as good of a fall stockpile as good old KY31. I like OG, and think it's more palatable with better growth potential, I just have better luck keeping it in the hayfields and fescue in my pastures.
 
cfpinz":m8l3jwfg said:
I'm a long ways from MN, but for us the OG doesn't stand up to grazing as well as fescue. It also doesn't provide as good of a fall stockpile as good old KY31. I like OG, and think it's more palatable with better growth potential, I just have better luck keeping it in the hayfields and fescue in my pastures.
Pretty much the same here, but we're pretty close to the same latitude.
 
Variety matters, I'm convinced.
Years ago, we planted Potomac and Benchmark - and, I think, Highmark, too. The OG would be the very last thing the cows would touch when grazing a new paddock...
Persist has been the go-to OG here for 10 years or more, and the cows like it, and eat it right along with the (novel-endophyte)fescue... after they've eaten the johnsongrass and crabgrass in the paddock.
 
Orchard grass outcompetes meadow fescue, grazed, cut or left alone. That is it. It has nothing to do with what the cattle prefers to eat.
 
Banjo":1k3py3le said:
Texasmark":1k3py3le said:
ddd75":1k3py3le said:
I'd take anything in my pasture other then ky31.

Why?
Yea...why?
Some cattle do not tolerate the fungus in KY31. Some die, some lose hooves and tails, some hide in the pond or in the shade, some do not breed, some do not gain. Universities say to spend a wad and replace it. For me, it is easier to raise cattle that tolerate it and you can dilute it with clovers, orchardgrass, decent minerals, whatever. Sure is cheap grazing, especially stockpiled and strip grazed. KY31 has become sort of a target to shoot at or a object to hate for the "knowing" and amazingly the seed companies do not like it and can sell you something so much better for so much more cost. Worked for decades (since 1931) and now it is trash. Go figure.
 
Ebenezer":l7jmdypw said:
Some cattle do not tolerate the fungus in KY31.
KY31 has become sort of a target to shoot at or a object to hate for the "knowing" and amazingly the seed companies do not like it and can sell you something so much better for so much more cost. Worked for decades (since 1931) and now it is trash. Go figure.
Could it be the increased cattle frame size from 1931 to now that requires animals to eat more of it that's causing more trouble?
 
Ebenezer":29y54hjg said:
Banjo":29y54hjg said:
Texasmark":29y54hjg said:
Yea...why?
Some cattle do not tolerate the fungus in KY31. Some die, some lose hooves and tails, some hide in the pond or in the shade, some do not breed, some do not gain. Universities say to spend a wad and replace it. For me, it is easier to raise cattle that tolerate it and you can dilute it with clovers, orchardgrass, decent minerals, whatever. Sure is cheap grazing, especially stockpiled and strip grazed. KY31 has become sort of a target to shoot at or a object to hate for the "knowing" and amazingly the seed companies do not like it and can sell you something so much better for so much more cost. Worked for decades (since 1931) and now it is trash. Go figure.

Thanks for your view/experiences.
 
Son of Butch":3k58v22k said:
Ebenezer":3k58v22k said:
Some cattle do not tolerate the fungus in KY31.
KY31 has become sort of a target to shoot at or a object to hate for the "knowing" and amazingly the seed companies do not like it and can sell you something so much better for so much more cost. Worked for decades (since 1931) and now it is trash. Go figure.
Could it be the increased cattle frame size from 1931 to now that requires animals to eat more of it that's causing more trouble?
In the past few decades they started breeding fescue to be more hardly, and grow in more soil types, like acidic clay hillsides.
But that came with major draw backs, because the new varieties are even more toxic, and started cross breeding, and inter-seeding with the old varieties. At least that is some of the theories.
A.I., and ET probably also didn't help any.
 

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