Overseeding a mostly grass hay field in Ky

Reid1650 · Feb 20, 2013

What grass would you overseed with for cattle hay? Looking for something that will produce a large number of rolls and that could be square baled and sold to horse people if the need arises. I realize this is very broad but give me your best advice please. This is central KY

Randysouthmississippi · Feb 20, 2013

Here in south/southcentral mississippi the best is costal bermuda or other variety of bermuda. Its not worth much for grazing but can be cut 3 or 4 times on a good year with good volume of bales.

Erik Ks farmer · Feb 20, 2013

What type of grass is the existing stand? In my experience it's hard to overvseed grass into grass, difficult to get much soil contact. Are you going to drill it or just broadcast?

Pair-a-dice farm · Feb 20, 2013

This isn't the best time of year for most seeding in my area of Arkansas but I have overseeded annual ryegrass in the spring with pretty good results. I don't know how good of horse hay it is but it does turn out very good tonnage.

David G · Feb 20, 2013

Overseeding is tough, have had best luck killing with roundup and drilling.

randyc1983 · Feb 20, 2013

Red clover. Did that once in feb. Got such a stand that the wheat it was seeded in was hard to combine. Had a good stand for three years. Makes good hay. Just broadcasted it with a seeder on the back of the tractor.

James Howell · Feb 21, 2013

Same here; either Coastal Bermuda or Tifton 85 Bermuda.

Anonymous-0 · Feb 21, 2013

Orchardgrass and Timothy with Red Clover the first week or two of March, chain harrow if possable. Stay away from Fescue in hayfield I only know of one horse person that has fescue on purpose.

KYfarm · Feb 21, 2013

I'm in north central KY and I have tried on different occasions to overseed grass into grass on hayfields and have given up on it. Just never get any results worth a darn.

Went ahead and roundup'd a hayfield two summers ago that was overrun with broom-sage. Got my first cutting, waited for rain, hit it with round-up. Waited for rain again in mid-august and sprayed again. Fertilized and then dragged my MF33 drill over it in mid-sept without discing the ground. Results were fantastic!

Thick solid stand of beautiful grass. Only lost one round of second cutting, which around my parts isn't usually worth much anyway.

johndeerefan · Feb 21, 2013

Here in South Central KY I haven't had much luck overseeding using the broadcast method. Only decent results were using the Farm Extension office's drill.

Timothy and orchard grass are about the best forage crops you can get in our area. Horse people love Timothy hay, cows like them both. If you plan to sell to horse people, do not sew any clover! Clover creates a chemical reaction with horse saliva and makes them foam at the mouth. Very small amounts won't hurt anything, but I have been told to never feed my horses straight clover hay. I have seen them foam at the mouth a couple of times.

Your best results will come from working the ground up and starting from scratch. I tend to have a better crop and less weeds using this method. A good field will last about 5 years before you have to start again. Don't forget to take a soil sample. 99.9% chance you are going to need at least 2 tons of lime per acre.

TominKy · Feb 21, 2013

Kyfarm, the presence of broom sage in a field indicates that the land needs lime. best to have the soil tested and apply what the test indicates. an application of lime and or fertilizer will do wonders to most fields.

Overseeding a mostly grass hay field in Ky

Reid1650

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Randysouthmississippi

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Erik Ks farmer

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Pair-a-dice farm

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David G

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randyc1983

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James Howell

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Anonymous-0

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KYfarm

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johndeerefan

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