Chicory – a proven champion. “In the thirteen years we have grown chicory we have naturally had dry years, but the year on year reliability of chicory has been proven to be a real champion” There was often a dramatic need for extra feed during the autumn months, so in 2003 I began planting Chicory. As the farm being mostly red soil it was hard to grow home grown feed at that time of year. Back then we planted full paddocks of chicory at a time from early to mid-September. The chicory grew really well, and with this spring planting and moisture available we would often be grazing within seven weeks of sowing. The chicory was grazed from late spring, […]
Tag: Summer Forage
Forage diversity with multi specie blends
Benefits of multi specie pasture swards are not a new occurrence, however there’s renewed interest in what diverse swards can offer modern production systems. Well-designed multi species pastures will have a diversity that can increase overall yield, diet composition and reduces the risks of a range of environmental challenges. On the flip side there are things to be aware of when grazing alternative crops such as optimising establishment, limited weed control and animal health issues such as high levels of nitrate in brassicas. Peter Notman, dairy farmer and forage specialist at Notman Pasture Seeds in Poowong says some producers add different varieties of seed to their standard winter and summer pasture stands to provide more forage diversity and drought hardiness. […]
Understanding maize sizing
When maize seed goes through the conditioning process, it is separated into fractions based on kernel size and shape creating uniformity. Fractions of seed corn in different kernel sizes averaged across leading Pioneer ® brand hybrid families in the northern U.S. SEED SIZE OVERVIEW Image supplied by Du Pont Pioneer IMPACT OF SEED SIZE SEED SIZE & RELATIVE IMPACT ON MAIZE YIELD Nearly all kernel sizes can be successfully planted with all planter types. Additional adjustment may be required in some cases KERNEL SIZE PLANTABILITY Kernel size-plantability guidelines for air, vacuum, finger pick-up and plate-type planters August 13, 2018