What kind of hay in Western Kentucky

[Gphillips]

I am looking at putting about 15-17 acres of our farm that have previously been in row crop production into hay production next year. We are located in extreme Western Kentucky. The ground is rolling and ranges from areas that are highly erodible to some that are only slightly erodible. I would like to go with some type perennial grass that will help hold the soil that is there. This will only be cut for hay and feed to beef cattle and possible horses. I would also like to find a crop that would yeild around 5 tons an acre per year and would rather not have to spring it.

Thanks

Greg

 

[Stepper]

If it were me i would check Midland 99 out. If i remember right with irrigation and fertlizer you can expect 9 tons per acre. But now you would have to either sprig it or broadcast it to get it started.

And no matter what kind of grass you decide to go with or even if you decide to back out and not plant any grass at all. You should let me come over during deer season and thin some of thoes darn grass eating deer out for you. :lol: I would do it just as a favor for a fellow cattle man. ;-) And free of charge. Even if you decide you want to just leave it in rowe crops. I would be willing to keep thoes dang deer in check just in case you change your mind in the future. 8)

But all kidding aside. I would give the Midland 99 some serious thought. There was a fella who had sprigged some in Western Tennessee last year who came here to the cattle forum and was talking about it. I can not remember exactly how many acres he sprigged and how much hay he was getting off of it. But it was unreal. I know at the time i made myself a mental note that the next time i sprig and grass i was going to give midland 99 some serious consideration.

I spriged some worldfeeder bermuda and it is ok. But it is not a high yeild producer. It is really not any better than native bermuda in my opinion.

Good luck.

 

[Stepper]

Now see Gphillips, now you have two fellow cattle forum members who are more than willing to help you out ! ;-) And i am even willing to sweeten the deal a little more. Not only would i be willing to take care of thoes no good, grass eat'n, no count for nothing deer for you. :lol:

I could even bring a bushel of sprigs and sprig them each time i came up to deer hunt , i i i i mean when i come up to keep the deer run off of the newly established grass ! 8)

I am sure Angus/Brangus would want to send a bunch of bodin along with me to give to you to show his apprechation ! Of course i would probably try say half of what he sent just to make sure it tasted ok.

 

[mnmtranching]

What's boudin sausage? would that work with elk or muley. :?:

 

[msscamp]

You should let me come over during deer season and thin some of thoes darn grass eating deer out for you. :lol: I would do it just as a favor for a fellow cattle man. ;-) And free of charge. Even if you decide you want to just leave it in rowe crops. I would be willing to keep thoes dang deer in check just in case you change your mind in the future. 8)

Planning any road trips to Wyoming? :lol: :lol: I'm not sure when deer season is here(I'm not a hunter - but I think it's fall and, if that is the case, we will have quite a few corn fed deer available - if you catch my drift), but I can find out! ;-) Angus/Brangus - that goes for you, too!

 

[mnmtranching]

You should let me come over during deer season and thin some of thoes darn grass eating deer out for you. :lol: I would do it just as a favor for a fellow cattle man. ;-) And free of charge. Even if you decide you want to just leave it in rowe crops. I would be willing to keep thoes dang deer in check just in case you change your mind in the future. 8)

Planning any road trips to Wyoming? :lol: :lol: I'm not sure when deer season is here(I'm not a hunter - but I think it's fall and, if that is the case, we will have quite a few corn fed deer available - if you catch my drift), but I can find out! ;-) Angus/Brangus - that goes for you, too!

Non Resident deer hunters must apply for WY licenses before March 15th. Get ready, plan for 08. 8) 8)

 

[msscamp]

You should let me come over during deer season and thin some of thoes darn grass eating deer out for you. :lol: I would do it just as a favor for a fellow cattle man. ;-) And free of charge. Even if you decide you want to just leave it in rowe crops. I would be willing to keep thoes dang deer in check just in case you change your mind in the future. 8)

Planning any road trips to Wyoming? :lol: :lol: I'm not sure when deer season is here(I'm not a hunter - but I think it's fall and, if that is the case, we will have quite a few corn fed deer available - if you catch my drift), but I can find out! ;-) Angus/Brangus - that goes for you, too!

Non Resident deer hunters must apply for WY licenses before March 15th. Get ready, plan for 08. 8) 8)

I knew there would be something I missed/didn't know about! :roll: :lol: :lol:

 

[Stepper]

msscamp,

I sure could make plans to come to Wyoming ! I have never been up in that part of the U.S. but i sure want to some day. I bet there are some big corn fed deer up there ? I just wonder if Wyoming has whitetail deer there ?

mnmtranching

boudin sausage is some of the best stuff you have ever eat. But it sure looks nasty. I think that is a cajuin dish. A couple of fellas from Lousiana brought some up to where i work and wanted us to give it a try. And like i said when i first looked at it, i told them there was no way i was going to eat anything that looked like that. :lol: But after i give it a try it is really good stuff. I wish i knew how to make it.

But you know i would bet that elk and muleys would make some excellent boudin sausage. But just to make sure you should let me and before you say no. It would not be any trouble at all and i would be more than happy to help. ;-) Come up and go with you to harvest a great big 8 x 8 elk so that i could take it back to Angus/Brangus to make some fresh boudin out of. 8) And then of coures and this would not be any trouble at all either. The following elk season i could bring some of it back up for you to try and see if you like it ! :lol:

And the only reason i say we kill a 8 x 8 is because i hear they make better sausage. But hey a 6 x 6 would work, you know just which ever you could put me on, i i i i mean which ever would be the easiest for us to get. 8)

And then we can always try the muleys to see what kind of boudin sausage they turn out !

 

[msscamp]

msscamp,

I just wonder if Wyoming has whitetail deer there ?

All of the deer in question are whitetail!

 

[Stepper]

:shock: :shock: :shock: msscamp ! Are we talking about deers or dears ? :shock:

 

[mnmtranching]

Stepper, Now that boudin sausage sounds interesting. Nasty looking huh? Just so happens I will be hunting deer in WY in Oct.
Region "E" that's a way's West of msscamps. Out by Sweet Water Station on the Beaver Rim Divide. Some wild country out there. Muley country, and Elk. I'm not licensed for Elk however. But I have the NR Big Game Combination license for MT that includes Elk Deer and upland birds. I'm going to be a busy old guy this fall. :shock:

 

[Gphillips]

Stepper, thanks for the info. Deer are not usually a problem around this farms, there are only about 5 or 6 of us that hunt them. We usually do a pretty good job of keeping the deer population down.

I had already been thinking about Bermudagrass, but I need some more inforamation about varieties and their establishment pratices. I forgot to mention that my uncle has 4 chicken barns so I will have a fairly large supply of litter that will be used as my Nitorgen source. Any idea on how much of it I would need to spread per acrea to get the proper about of Nitorgen.

Thanks

 

[msscamp]

:shock: :shock: :shock: msscamp ! Are we talking about deers or dears ? :shock:

What, exactly, is a dears? These are deer - d-e-e-r. :lol: :lol: They are easily discernable by the white flash when they raise their tail and flee after being startled, as well as their smaller stature as compared to mule deer. The number of them isn't hugh, by any means, but there are a number of them that take advantage of the corn fields, alfalfa field, grass field and, this year, the new barley/grass field. I'm not sure of the actual numbers, but last year the south corn fields looked like they had been hit by giant locust long about August/September! One day, about mid summer last year, I saw a small herd of about 8 or 10 at the north end of the west pivot(corn). I didn't realize deer were curious creatures until that day - I was downwind from them, and saw them come out of the corn before they saw me. I stood stock still, and they came to within a few feet of me trying to figure out what I was. It was pretty cool! :lol: :lol:

 

[Gphillips]

I'm not real worried about making good neighbors, pretty much all my neighbors are family, one of whom I will be getting the litter from. I have just be trying to find what variety I need to sow/sprig.

 

[Stepper]

Gphillips,

This is what i would do if i were going to etablish some new grass.

1. The first thing would be to take soil samples and go talk with your local extention agent. He can tell you what grass does the best in your area and how much tonage per acre each will produce.(And all the good/bad points each grass has)

2. Then as soon as i got my soil samples back and i had decided on which grass i was going to establish. At the end of the summer spray the whole feild with round up and kill all the existing grass out. Then i would take and plow the whole palce up about a foot deep. Then disc it up really good.

3. Then i would plant it with sometype of winter grass just to keep from losing the top soil to errosion or wind. You can also use it for early grazing next Spring.

4. Then i would do what my soil samples recommended doing. But with your land already being crop land. It probalby wont be much. However if it does need any lime to get the ph level right on it. They tell me it takes about six months for lime to change the ph level. So you would want to get it limed this fall to have it ready to sprig by next Spring.

5. So now you have your pasture land all prepared sort of like preparing a garden ready to be planted. It has all the unwanted grass killed out, the ph level is where it needs to be for the type of grass you have decided to establish.

6. The next thing to do is to pick the right time to sprig your grass. And on bemuda grass that is a critical time.( Ideal time for your area i would guess would be the last week of April or first of May.) If you sprig to soon and it stays cold and wet on the new sprigs to long they rot. If you sprig to late you miss out on alot of the Spring rain that a newly spriged feild needs to make it.

7. Now about 2 weeks before you decide to plant your feild spray it again with round up and kill everything out again. Then just a couple of days before planting time disc it under as deep as you can. Make the whole feild powder.

8. Now a cheaper way to plant the feild is to take a utility trailer and let the guy your buying the sprigs off of load them right onto the trailer. And get 4 or 5 people on the trailer, pull onto the feild and let them start scattering the sprigs by hand. Kind of look at it like a checker board pattern but only with 10' x 10' squares on the board. Cover a square, skip a square. This way the skipped squares will grow (or fill in by spreading) This method of planting a feild is called broad casting.

9. Now after you get all of the sprigs scattered. Take your disc and go lightly over the feild just enough to lightly cover your sprigs( a couple inches will be fine) Dont burry them deep though.

10. If it were me i would not use chicken litter on sprigs that are just tring to get established.( It is to rich and would probably burn the new sprigs up) So use a light application of amonia nitrate ( 150 lbs to the acre) that will put alot of nitrogen in the soil and make the sprigs take root and start putting out runners. Check with your extenison agent to make sure on the amonia nitrate application.

11. Last but not least give me a call 2 weeks before deer season and give me a rut report on the deer activity going on near and arround the newly sprigged feild. Then that way i can come watch the feild for the first week of deer season each year and give you pointers on what you need to do to keep the maintance of the feild up for maximum production. And i will need to shoot a few deer(peferribly mature 5 to 8 year old trophy bucks) each year to check their stomach contents to make sure they are not eating to much of the newly established grass. 8)

 

[Stepper]

msscamp,

:lol: :lol: :lol: I was mixed up there ! :lol: :lol: :lol: When you said all the deer in question were white tailed deer. I was thinking to myself that surely Wymoing has mule deer to ? So how could they all be white tailed deer. :lol:

I see what you are saying now. I guess even mule deer has white tails ? See white tail deer and mule deer are two different breeds of deer. You may already know that though ?

 

[Stepper]

mnmtranching,

Hunting mule deer in Wyoming then elk in Montana. :roll: I could see where that would be a terrible burden for a old guy to have to deal with ! :roll: I feel sorry for you having to deal with such a problem like that. :roll:

If i remember right, to be eligible to draw for a NR tag in Wyoming dont you have to have a resident guide ? And is Montana like that also ?

Now i think in New Mexico a NR has to have a guide before he can draw for a NR tag ?

Most people in my area ( North West Arkansas) hunt for elk in South Western Colorado i think because it is the closest destination. It is about 1000 miles one way. And just that distance gets real exspensive of a trip. With NR license at $500

It cost me right at $2000 for the trip i took in 2005. So the next time i go elk hunting i am going to try to go with someone who knows what is going on. $500 is to much to pay for tag soup.

 

[Arnold Ziffle]

stepper -- if he in fact uses sprigs (or tops) in an attempt to establish bermuda, how about adding step 9 1/2 = roll or pack it?

Alas, as I recall, a whitetail would starve to death in a field of bermuda only.

 

[Stepper]

Arnold Ziffle & Angus/Brangus

That is a very good point. I did not do that when i planted my feild but was told i should have after the fact. And i will do that the next time i try to establish new grass. I guess i was lucky that my grass took even though i missed that critical step of the process.

But now it is still very critical that Gphillips has me to come over each deer season for say the next 25 to 30 years and check the feild out. Even though a white tail will starve to death on bermuda grass alone. It is no trouble at all and it is the least i can do to help a fellow cattle man out. ;-)

 

[msscamp]

msscamp,

I see what you are saying now. I guess even mule deer has white tails ? See white tail deer and mule deer are two different breeds of deer. You may already know that though ?

Yes, I knew that whitetail and mule deer are two different breeds of deer. Having said that, it would appear that you caught me in a major mistake - the deer in question are mule deer, not whitetails. I suspect you already knew that, though. What can I say? I'm not a hunter and I screwed up - again! :lol: :lol: