Crop recommendation
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Printed Date: 05 Oct 2024 at 5:37pm
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Topic: Crop recommendation
Posted By: dr p
Subject: Crop recommendation
Date Posted: 24 Jan 2024 at 7:39pm
So i just bought a 13 acres field 5 miles down the street. Would like a little input on what to plant. Field is oneida soil which is fertile well drained gravel. Ph is 6.3. Field hasn't been farmed in a number of years. It is grown up with weeds but no sumac or multi flower rose.
I can grow pretty much anything but silage isn't an option (too far to haul wagons ). I am not organic so round up will be in the plan.
Any thoughts?
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Replies:
Posted By: Lars(wi)
Date Posted: 24 Jan 2024 at 8:01pm
Well, I take it the crop will for your own use?
First what crop do you need?
Are you planning on crop rotation?
What do neighbors in the area need?
When you say ‘too far for silage’, you mean corn silage, haylage?
5 miles is not bad, how road worthy is your equipment?
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I tried to follow the science, but it was not there. I then followed the money, and that’s where I found the science.
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Posted By: AC7060IL
Date Posted: 24 Jan 2024 at 8:15pm
More info please…
Oneida County soils?
Average annual growing degrees? Heat units?
Corn 75-115day, soybean 1.6-2.3 maturity ranges?
Cereal grains?
Well drained gravel, so what’s it Slope % ?
Here’s a Cornell Cooperative Extension Oneida County for ag crops general info.
https://cceoneida.com/agriculture/specific-crops" rel="nofollow - https://cceoneida.com/agriculture/specific-crops
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Posted By: dr p
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 6:23am
Answer some of the questions it is dead flat, no need to contour. Its extra ground so really don't need to gear it toward what i need for the cows but i could plant a field a home in cash crops. Normal rotation for me is corn, beans, hay and an occasional wheat or triticale if the spring is too wet to get everything in.
My first thought was to put oats on it. I could sell the straw easy but the grain around here is hard to get a heavy enough test weight to sell. Figure oats would help deal with the heavy weed seed population.
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Posted By: Lars(wi)
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 6:50am
If oats are tuff to sell, and you are not set up for on-farm storage for oats, skip that option. Until you get accustomed to the routine of this plot of land in your operation, I’d go corn the first year or two(maybe three) if you are comfortable with corn on corn on corn.
How good are the fences(if any)?
Is water available, either pond, creek, tap? If good fences, and water, why not pasture it?
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I tried to follow the science, but it was not there. I then followed the money, and that’s where I found the science.
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Posted By: Tbone95
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 9:25am
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Do you know anyone with a bale wrapper to rent? Could still do oats but wrap them as haylage, your cows will eat every trace and harvest conditions couldn’t be more forgiving.
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Posted By: dr p
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 3:40pm
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yeah, trying to get anyone to do custom work around here is impossible for an operation my size, though I do agree oat balage is the cow equivalent of chocolate. Ithaca is usually about 2400 degree days growing season.
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Posted By: Tbone95
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 3:46pm
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Thought maybe a dealership would. Oh well.
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Posted By: dr p
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 6:29pm
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No fences, yet. And there isn't a lot of good tillable ground around here. But if it was the clay that most ground around here is, pasture is exactly what it would be
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Posted By: dr p
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 6:37pm
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T bone, my dealership would love to help" Doc, let's see if we can get you some equipment that was not made 70 years ago" i bought a new skid loader last year and the salesman thought i was joking. Had to go to the store manager. Alley thought i had a stroke. Just getting too old to muscle everything
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Posted By: Tbone95
Date Posted: 25 Jan 2024 at 7:28pm
II meant rent from a dealer. Ya, they’d love to sell me stuff too!
I think corn silage might work. 5 miles isn’t that bad if you have help. Let you get the ground tilled and lots of options to get the weeds under control.
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Posted By: WF owner
Date Posted: 26 Jan 2024 at 7:41am
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I did oats on a similar field several years ago (90's). Since I was still milking, we cut them green and baled them (only to find that the 44 AC bale thrower on a 444 AC baler does not throw green oats very well at all).
Clean straw brings crazy prices up here on the Canadian border. I see straw for $5 - $6 per bale all the time.
Just an idea, but maybe your local Cooperative Extension agent would have some ideas.
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Posted By: Dirt Farmer
Date Posted: 27 Jan 2024 at 1:00am
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I would consider soybeans first, reason is you can preplant herbicides to clean up the field and find boundaries before planting and easier to see weed pressure during growing season, second you don't say if it is a square field, odd shape field take extra seed if doing corn. Soybeans could be harvested or if things go south plan B cut for livestock needs. Off season can get in there earlier to clean up field edges and repair any drainage concerns while there isn't much trash on the fields then follow up the next year with corn but this is just thoughts from a farmer in Illinois.
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Posted By: dr p
Date Posted: 27 Jan 2024 at 12:45pm
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one of my patients thought buckwheat followed by a cereal grain would br good. have no experience with buckwheat. Isn't it very short season, like 70 day growing season?
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Posted By: WF owner
Date Posted: 27 Jan 2024 at 3:44pm
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In our area (5 miles from the Quebec border), buckwheat is planted as late as early July. It's often plowed down as a "green manure" type fertilizer, especially on a field that has not been in production for several years. IIRC (and it's been a long time), I remember Dad saying that buckwheat was tough to combine, if you are going to grow it for grain. If it gets too mature, it shatters when the combine reel hits it and field losses are very high.
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Posted By: WF owner
Date Posted: 27 Jan 2024 at 3:47pm
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https://www.hort.cornell.edu/bjorkman/lab/buck/guide/growthdevelopment.php" rel="nofollow - Buckwheat Information (cornell.edu)
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Posted By: Lars(wi)
Date Posted: 27 Jan 2024 at 4:46pm
Hopefully not any saplings in the average, depending on the thatch that is more likely present, is your first challenge. Burn off? Moldboard plow? Chisel?
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I tried to follow the science, but it was not there. I then followed the money, and that’s where I found the science.
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Posted By: dr p
Date Posted: 27 Jan 2024 at 6:55pm
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Going to bush hog it then plow it with my disc plow
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