Wholecrop silage

muckymanor said:
To rise its head again, what about red clover? Plenty of reading about its advantages for silage on the interweb. Seed is not too expensive. It provides a heavier crop than grass, can be up to 20% protein, would be ideal for feeding weinlings ad lib. It appears that the later varieties of it are suitable for 1 cut silage in mid june and grazing after that.

Anyone got any experience of it or able to give pros and cons?
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I would be growing Red Clover as cut only crop, maybe a late grazing at most. lovely crop to grow (be it I sowed it on rented ground, cut one crop of silage of it and then the landlord died and I was turffed out:lol:). Good lash of organic fertiliser when the ground is dry and dont harvest when conditions arent suitable. Fed out well but may want to feed bales a little quicker. If I recall for forage test the silage was up around 17%(dont quote me on this as its 5 yrs ago) I would have grown more o f it but it just didnt fit into my rotation until now again. Well worth considering
 
I'm.not sure what you have proposed will work muckymanor.

My understanding with red clover is its far better cut every six weeks or so rather than waiting on it to bulk up to June like you say.

Most say it's only a four/five year crop but in fairness you would be after cutting it 3/4 times a year by then.
 
Fr
nashmach said:
I'm.not sure what you have proposed will work muckymanor.

My understanding with red clover is its far better cut every six weeks or so rather than waiting on it to bulk up to June like you say.

Most say it's only a four/five year crop but in fairness you would be after cutting it 3/4 times a year by then.
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From what i have read there are 2 types of red clover. An early type suited to cutting 3 times in the year which isn't really suited to grazing. Then there's a late type which is bulks up very well and is more suited to one cut per year mid to end of june and grazing after that. Will find the name of it later when i sit at the pc.

Edit: The Red clover that I am talking about is altaswede. Its specifically for single cut silage as it has more bottom than other varieties. It produces most of its annual yield at the main first growth flush and it is more persistent than other varieties of clover. Second growths are light and well suited to grazing.
 
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muckymanor said:
Grow a high protein feed that is reasonably priced to sow, easy to harvest, easy to store so that I don't have to build sheds or worry about vermin and easy to feed.

Would like to incorporate it into the reseed.

Why do you ask?
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just trying to get an idea before commenting really, leave it with me ill think about it...
 
Blackwater boy said:
just trying to get an idea before commenting really, leave it with me ill think about it...
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I started the thread with the idea of a wholecrop as part of the reseeding. A lot of flaws were pointed out with that:

Mowing - not able to use a conditioner.
Weather
Storage - vermin being the big one
Quality

Red clover could solve most if not all of these issues and give a good high protein feed.
 
Interestingly, red clover fixes twice the amount of N compared to white clover (or so I read once).

The crown of the plant (growing point) sits higher than white clover and therefore it is much more susceptible to damage from poaching and cutting too tight.
 
johndeere6920s said:
Red clover is temperamental.
If you mow it too bare it dies If it's grazed tight it dies.
I tink you mentioned that your land is heavy enough.
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The altaswede clover that I mentioned above is recommended for heavy soils, although where I am planning on reseeding is pretty good soil as neighbouring fields grew corn and kale in recent years. It's also a very hardy clover with a well formed base so stands up to grazing better than other types of clover.
 
To rise its head again, the next 2 weeks will see us stitch in 5 acres of a grass reseed using a specialised mix which is red clover heavy land mixture. It contains 30% altaswede red clover, 10% white clover and 20%, 20% and 20% of Glenstall, Premium and twymax ryegrass. It is specifically for a single cut of silage per year and has a dense bottom regrowth making it more suitable for grazing after the cut of silage.
 
muckymanor said:
To rise its head again, the next 2 weeks will see us stitch in 5 acres of a grass reseed using a specialised mix which is red clover heavy land mixture. It contains 30% altaswede red clover, 10% white clover and 20%, 20% and 20% of Glenstall, Premium and twymax ryegrass. It is specifically for a single cut of silage per year and has a dense bottom regrowth making it more suitable for grazing after the cut of silage.
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Bit early old chum to be going direct drilling. I prefer doing when growth is up near max so it jumps out of the ground and doesn't come under pressure from a whole host of things
 
Ozzy Scott said:
Bit early old chum to be going direct drilling. I prefer doing when growth is up near max so it jumps out of the ground and doesn't come under pressure from a whole host of things
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Plan is to do it around mid april when growth gets moving. Hope to get a bit of slurry out on top of it first.
 
4255 said:
Is peas worth any real benefit ? ,I am going to sow a field with barley and make whole crop of it later
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I'm not able to answer that. At the start of this thread I was asking about wholecrop silage and to be fair, a lot of the lads advised me to stay away from it for a variety of reasons. One of the main reasons was the threat of vermin. So with that in mind I did some research. My hope was to find something that could be baled, stored safely and fed ad lib. It need to be high protein (although I'm not looking for a super feed) for to feed to weinlings. Based on that I found the idea of red clover appealing. Further to that, I found the alteswede red clover which is one of the few clover's that's suitable for a 1 cut crop. Going to test it out anyway and see what it brings. The most that it can do is fail, but the grass seed should come up anyway.
 
if the point of this is to just get cover for the new grass, how about cutting it before the barley heads? You'll get quite a good yield of green crop and it'll have protected the grass which I assume is the main reason you want to sow it, plus you'll get another cut and maybe a grazing from the grass afterwards before the autumn.
 
muckymanor said:
I'm not able to answer that. At the start of this thread I was asking about wholecrop silage and to be fair, a lot of the lads advised me to stay away from it for a variety of reasons. One of the main reasons was the threat of vermin. So with that in mind I did some research. My hope was to find something that could be baled, stored safely and fed ad lib. It need to be high protein (although I'm not looking for a super feed) for to feed to weinlings. Based on that I found the idea of red clover appealing. Further to that, I found the alteswede red clover which is one of the few clover's that's suitable for a 1 cut crop. Going to test it out anyway and see what it brings. The most that it can do is fail, but the grass seed should come up anyway.
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you can make grass silage with high protein aswell if you cut it at the right stage of growth.
 
jcb411abuser said:
you can make grass silage with high protein aswell if you cut it at the right stage of growth.
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I was reconing that a real good protein level for grass silage would be 12% - teagasc have published statisctis from some of the best farms on some of the best land in the country and the top appears to be just over 12.5% at 72dmd. You're talking 15% to 20% for red clover.
 
I think it was ithastopay that had baled silage tested at 16 protein. Haylage I think.

If you could get top notch grass silage made it would be a very simple feed for weanings​
 
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