Help with fall seeding of grass hay

Jason S.

Well-known Member
After the horrible year of hay we have had here in east TN I got my 2nd cutting baled. I saw a lot of bare spots in the fields so I'm pretty sure I need to reseed the fields. It hasn't been done in several years. Mostly what is there is red clover,timothy, and grass. From what I have read timothy is not one of the higher yielding grasses. But that is some of the problem. You can read 100 things and they will all say something different. So what is the higher yielding grasses? I don't pasture these fields they are simply hay fields now. From what I had read orchard grass gives a lot of tonnage but I don't know. I knew you guys would have real world experience thats why I come here and ask. Thank you for all your help.
 
I would suppose your geographic location, weather and similar play a role too, and like is always said conditions vary. I've seen some very thick stands of orchard grass grown for hay grasses around here, seemingly it does well. Almost 10 years ago my farmer/friend planted large field in hay grasses adjacent to us, and it was thick with timothy, I don't recall seeing a field planted like that before, usually more of a mixture, but if anyone knew how to plant hay grasses, he certainly did. Orchard would appear to yield more, comparing both stands off memory, will top and mature sooner too. Seems to spread rapidly. The other thing is soil fertility, PH and all that.

I do like a mid-late summer planting for next season, I did that with food plots last year and got some nice early stands of clover and grasses, easy to kill off weeds or so it seemed this spring. Like most would say, check with your local ag cooperative extension or agency in your area too. If you can meet the criteria for the suitable grasses in your area, get the soil right, PH/fertility, any compaction, subsoiling needed, if applicable, with timely rain, around here there does not seem to be a lot to planting and growing hay grasses, it does well here. New plantings usually have a nurse crop, oats per what my friend used to plant, he'd harvest them too if I recall, or has, then the hay grasses would fill in, his stands of hay were always very impressive, lot of years of experience, weather plays a roll, I do recall one planting getting washed out, one he did here when I was really young, heavy rain at the right time.
 
Can't even have this discussion unless you do a
real soil analysis.

Small money for what it'll give you.

Take several samples, send them in, you'll get
a breakdown of exactly what your soil is, and
what it wants.

Most likely scenario is you're ph is low and
(if you're fertilizing) it's not doing much
good - with low ph, your nitrogen is being
wasted.

You HAVE to have the right ph balance before
anything else, and it can take 6 months for
liming it to bring the ph up, so definitely do
it soon.

Once the ph is brought into range, you want to
add fertilizer according to the analysis
results.

Having fertile ground will make your field
explode, no matter what's in there - even weeds
:)

Adding seed at this point without verifying the
ground CAN support healthy grass is a mistake.

Not saying it doesn't need seed - just that
acid level and fertility is what makes a hay field
produce.

If the field is all timothy - that DOES need to
be reseeded every 3 years or so. But even so
- even if you really do need new seed, you'd
still need the proper ph and fertilizer levels.
 
(quoted from post at 15:54:26 09/30/14) Can't even have this discussion unless you do a
real soil analysis.

Small money for what it'll give you.

Take several samples, send them in, you'll get
a breakdown of exactly what your soil is, and
what it wants.

Most likely scenario is you're ph is low and
(if you're fertilizing) it's not doing much
good - with low ph, your nitrogen is being
wasted.

You HAVE to have the right ph balance before
anything else, and it can take 6 months for
liming it to bring the ph up, so definitely do
it soon.

Once the ph is brought into range, you want to
add fertilizer according to the analysis
results.

Having fertile ground will make your field
explode, no matter what's in there - even weeds
:)

Adding seed at this point without verifying the
ground CAN support healthy grass is a mistake.

Not saying it doesn't need seed - just that
acid level and fertility is what makes a hay field
produce.

If the field is all timothy - that DOES need to
be reseeded every 3 years or so. But even so
- even if you really do need new seed, you'd
still need the proper ph and fertilizer levels.

My soil samples have already been done and needs addressed. The grass choices are what I got from Ag extension from the university of TN. That's why I wanted to know which one of those produces the most tonnage between Timothy, Fescue, and Orchard grass.
 
I'm west of you a few hundred miles but have similar issues. Here we have had very little luck with a good stand of orchard grass. There are some new varieties of fescue that have improved over the old Ky31 variety. Personally I like Marshal Ryegrass. I just got done planting 80 acres this morning. It's easy to plant and you can get som fall and early winter grazing. I usually can get up to 2 1/2 to 3 tons per acre of hay in one cutting. The biggest drawback is you have to plant every year. I have had some luck mixing ryegrass and fescue to help with the first year yields.
 
You want a mix. A few varieties of Orchard grass,
fescue, italian rye, even crabgrass and timothy
mixed with some different kinds of legumes. When
I sew hay fields, I may have 10 different seeds in
the planter mixed together. Just use the
appropriate boxes.
 
Take what I say with a grain of salt, but....

We are going to reseed two fields, one in 100% orchard grass
and the other 100% timothy.

We want to be in the market for horse hay buyers, both
timothy and orchard grass take us there. I think fescue will
yield more crop and last longer without reseeding, but the
perception among most horse owners I speak with is you
cannot feed fescue to horses.

The other reason for two separate seed types is maturity.
Timothy comes in later than orchard grass, so we can deal
with one field at a time vs putting it all down at once and all of
the hay getting rained on at once too!

But if I had to plant one grass (I'm in central/western VA), it
would be orchard grass. Robust hay, two cuttings per year,
acceptable from cow to horse owners.

Good luck,
Bill
 
sorry, it wasn't mentioned so I assumed it
wasn't done.

That's the only reason I responded, I'm in the
northeast, so I'm not sure any grass choice
experience here would apply there.

Around here, I'd say nobody would fault you for
going with orchard grass if you're just trying
to make the most number of bales (and you have
very consistent conditions that you can depend
on).

There might be others that can outproduce it by
a little bit, but honestly I think you're
splitting hairs. But could be a lot different
down there.
 

It's mainly horse people that buy my hay. The problem I have is I don't have enough to go around since my yields are down.
 
Well it isn't all Timothy because there is red clover mixed in with it but the bare spots I'm seeing are not in the clover so I would say it is where the timothy is needing to be reseeded. I'm going to leave the clover since its a legume,but from the advice I'm getting on here it sounds like I need to seed a mix of Timothy and orchard grass. I know the horse people like my hay because of it being Timothy but I need to bring my yields up. I'm thinking maybe a mix of 70% orchard and 30% Timothy since there is still some Timothy still there. Does that mix sound about right?
 
Orchardgrass has few if any insect pests. Here, we have to battle cereal rust mite to keep a stand of timothy going more than a couple years. Timothy also goes dormant if it gets too dry so sometimes it's only a one-cutting deal for us, but orchardgrass keeps growing in the same conditions. Just some things to consider.
 

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