Rotating between brassicas

Scott

Yearling... With promise
This is probably a stupid question... regarding the recommendation to not plant brassicas more than 2 years before rotating, can you plant a different variety in year 3? Can you plant turnips for 2 years and then rotate to radish or kale in year 3?
 
Nope to both. It is not a stupid question. The recommendation is for farmers that plant monocultures. When you plant a monoculture you have a high plant density increasing the chances for disease. A farmer can be wiped out financially by disease. I plant brassica (PTT and Radish) as part of a cover crop mix each year. There are only a couple lbs/ac of brassica in the mix. The rest is usually crimson clover and Winter Rye. I surface broadcast this into standing beans year after year for many years. I've seen no signs of disease.

I just keep an eye on it. If I ever see disease, I'll simply skip the brassica for a year. Even if I would get a bad case of disease, it would not be a big loss. The WR and CC would simply fill the gap nicely. We have significant advantages over farmers!

Thanks,

Jack
 
Agree with what’s stated by jack. I have planted brassicas in the same plot for 3 years. This was the first year I have had any sort of issue and I think it was due to the extremely warm temps that let the bugs come back out in the fall. Plants still grew 3ft tall and had turnips bigger than softballs.. I try to always have something growing in the plot for spring, whether it’s soybeans, clover or buckwheat just to break it up a bit from always having the same thing.
 
So planted in a mix there is no need to take a break for s few years? I only use brasicas in mixes.

I wanted to turn most of my small plots in PA into oats/rye/brasica/clover mixes since this mix has been much more productive than my clover plots. Also planning a new property that im going to try to get beans established and like the idea of overseeding rye and brasicas. (Never had enough acreage before to establish beans without a fence so im just beginning to game plan)
 
There probably isn’t a need right away. Just simply watch each year and if needed adjust the following year. I think with your mix, there is less concern because it’s not a straight mono culture.
 
I have 3 small plots and I rotate every year. One year my biggest plot gets total brassicas and the other 2 smaller plots get a mix of grains. The next year the 2 small plots will get total brassicas and the biggest one gets grains. In my opinion, I want maximum tonnage. As stated by Paul Knox, never mix brassicas with anything. When brassicas are planted at the proper rate, they will grow quicker, canopy and shade out to a large extent all other vegetation. When you mix other things with brassicas you will compromise one type of food for another. Rotate every year, get maximum tonnage and never have a problem with disease.
 
I have 3 small plots and I rotate every year. One year my biggest plot gets total brassicas and the other 2 smaller plots get a mix of grains. The next year the 2 small plots will get total brassicas and the biggest one gets grains. In my opinion, I want maximum tonnage. As stated by Paul Knox, never mix brassicas with anything. When brassicas are planted at the proper rate, they will grow quicker, canopy and shade out to a large extent all other vegetation. When you mix other things with brassicas you will compromise one type of food for another. Rotate every year, get maximum tonnage and never have a problem with disease.

The problem with that logic is that assumes all the food planted ends up in a deer's belly. Deer are browsers, not grazers. Our food plots are a fraction of their total diet. Food plots are either for attraction, feeding, or both. For feeding they are intended to fill gaps in quality food that nature leaves. If food plots are completely wiped out, they are too small. If there is food left in them after the stress period is over it is excess yield which most folks have.

Diversity of plants improves not only the plants and what they offer deer, but the health of the soil itself. I always use brassica as part of a cover crop mix. Some like radish provide organic tillage. You do need to keep the brassica component low (2 to 3 lbs/ac) depending on the brassica. I always end up with plenty of turnips left over at the end of winter that need to be terminated in the spring. Not only do components of the mix like WR and Crimson Clover peak at different times than the turnips, when I use a tiller set very high (no more than the top inch), it does not negatively impact the WR and CC. They take over the field and provide good spring food.

There are always exceptional cases, but in general, tonnage is overrated. If deer density is high, native habitat is poor, and acreage is limited, tonnage may be a factor, but for most, we are better off long term with the diversity of a mix and more acreage planted with lower yields per acre. When combined with soil health promoting planting technique, we end up with better soil health, lower input cost, and serve wildlife better. There are some cases where strip planting has some advantages, but in general, I like mixes.

So planted in a mix there is no need to take a break for s few years? I only use brasicas in mixes.

I wanted to turn most of my small plots in PA into oats/rye/brasica/clover mixes since this mix has been much more productive than my clover plots. Also planning a new property that im going to try to get beans established and like the idea of overseeding rye and brasicas. (Never had enough acreage before to establish beans without a fence so im just beginning to game plan)

Yes. If you only use brassica in mixes and you keep the rates down to a couple lbs/ac, chances of disease are low and so are the consequences if it does occur.

Thanks,

Jack
 
Jack, my logic is correct. My plots are in planted pines and are around 1/4 to 1/2 acre plots with a 1/2 acre permanent clover plot as well. The plots don't get hit very hard until the lower browse is gone, which is now. With these plots located in the pines, every ounce of brassicas and grains will be devoured by the end of February. The brassicas and grains will be eaten to the ground, giving the deer and turkeys some much needed protein through the colder parts of our winter. These plots are small but they do serve that purpose you describe, filling gaps. You talk about diversity and diversity is what is created. A plot of durana clover, with 2 plots of grains and a slightly larger plot of brassicas, with the grains and brassicas rotated every year. I wish I could create larger plots but in planted pines you can only accomplish so much with the limited space, so tonnage is the key to give the deer and turkeys as much as possible through our mild winters. The does are doing well with several having multiple healthy fawns and the entire herd is fat and healthy. Here's a couple of PICS taken a month and a half ago. The brassicas, in the first image, are 2 feet tall and filled in very nice. The grains, in image two, have grown very nicely and filled in as well. Here's a buck taken Thursday morning 11/9/17 just past the end of the brassicas. Quality food at the right time of the year.
 

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Jack, my logic is correct. My plots are in planted pines and are around 1/4 to 1/2 acre plots with a 1/2 acre permanent clover plot as well. The plots don't get hit very hard until the lower browse is gone, which is now. With these plots located in the pines, every ounce of brassicas and grains will be devoured by the end of February. The brassicas and grains will be eaten to the ground, giving the deer and turkeys some much needed protein through the colder parts of our winter. These plots are small but they do serve that purpose you describe, filling gaps. You talk about diversity and diversity is what is created. A plot of durana clover, with 2 plots of grains and a slightly larger plot of brassicas, with the grains and brassicas rotated every year. I wish I could create larger plots but in planted pines you can only accomplish so much with the limited space, so tonnage is the key to give the deer and turkeys as much as possible through our mild winters. The does are doing well with several having multiple healthy fawns and the entire herd is fat and healthy. Here's a couple of PICS taken a month and a half ago. The brassicas, in the first image, are 2 feet tall and filled in very nice. The grains, in image two, have grown very nicely and filled in as well. Here's a buck taken Thursday morning 11/9/17 just past the end of the brassicas. Quality food at the right time of the year.

I wasn't suggesting your approach isn't a good fit for you. That is why I put in the section about special situations. I was suggesting that the logic of maximizing tonnage is the exception, not the rule. As for diversity, the best diversity starts at the low level where different plants complement each other in development. It is rare to see monocultures in nature. Once mechanical farming started, monocultures aided in planting, maintaining, and harvesting. Farmers soon learned that rotation was the best they could do to mimic the positive effects of diversity.

Not critiquing you approach at all for your situation. Just saying that in most cases tonnage on a per acre basis is less important than acreage under production.


Thanks,

Jack
 
I understood what you were saying from the start. I wanted to explain my unique situation and let everyone know, that you don't have to do what everyone else is doing to have success. This idea actually came from watching the farmers, in our area, rotate soybeans and corn from year to year, to help control nitrogen fertilizer costs for the corn. Even though my small plots wouldn't allow soybeans, without fencing, I can still maximize my brassicas and grains and have a rotation that benefits the brassicas. The wildlife get a great benefit from the tonnage and help get them through our mild winters healthy, ready to drop their fawns in April and jump start that antler growth. One size doesn't fit everyone. Your insight on soil health and agronomy is invaluable. Thanks.
 
Yes, your approach is a good fit for your situation. We all have different situations, constraints, and resources. In general, more acreage planted with lower yields and more diversity are a better approach, but not everyone has that option. I also find that distributing small plots over a larger area tends to help. I find that different doe groups tend to anchor around each small plot. When I say small, I'm talking 1/4 -1/3 acre. I tend to look at these as my harvest plots, but because I keep them in a clover base, the cumulative effect of them adds to feeding as well. I use my larger central plots for feeding. They get beans with a light mix of corn in the summer followed by the cover crop in the fall.

I find this far south (and you are south of me), that my major stress period is summer. My surface broadcast fall cover crop is as much focused on soil health as food for deer. One thing that has really helped us in recent years is timber management. The combination of dividing pines into management units for thinning and target TPA, and the use of controlled burns has really improved our native foods and cover in what was becoming a pine desert.

I'm glad you made theses posts and shared your approach. Folks can often benefit more from understanding the whys behind different approaches and discussions help that.

Thanks,

Jack
 
When brassicas are planted at the proper rate, they will grow quicker, canopy and shade out to a large extent all other vegetation. When you mix other things with brassicas you will compromise one type of food for another. Rotate every year, get maximum tonnage and never have a problem with disease.
That depends on how deer use your brassica. A lot of us have deer eating them early and often. I have a hard time getting my brassica to crowd out anything.
 
How deer use brassica in my area is interesting. I often drill GHR into suppressed clover. In a normal year, deer will start hitting GHR as soon as the leaves form, even in early October. The completely ignore PTT leaves at that time. After we get a good hard frost, usually in Nov, deer will start using PTT leaves. Then in December they will start on the GHR tubers. It is usually not after our season is well over, sometime in February that deer start using our PTT tubers. One year, we had a mast crop failure. That year deer were eating PTT bulbs along with everything else by early Nov.

Thanks,
Jack
 
That depends on how deer use your brassica. A lot of us have deer eating them early and often. I have a hard time getting my brassica to crowd out anything.
Tap, I'm wondering what problems you are having that won't allow the brassicas to canopy. Could you give us some more information. Is it because the deer are hitting them early, not planting them early enough, not enough fertilizer or poor soil conditions?
 
Tap, I'm wondering what problems you are having that won't allow the brassicas to canopy. Could you give us some more information. Is it because the deer are hitting them early, not planting them early enough, not enough fertilizer or poor soil conditions?
It's mostly from early browsing. My herd is one of the kind that don't wait for brassica to freeze before they pound it.

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Tap, My brassicas normally get hit hard when the lower browse / leaves fall off the trees. Which is normally about our first fall frost date, around the 10th of November. I use this date, 10 November, back up 90 days and plant my brassicas. My question to you is, when are you planting in SW PA? For SW PA, I would guess your first frost and leaf drop is around the 15th-30th of September. If you back up from those dates, you should be planting around the 4th of July or a bit earlier. With proper rain, fertilization and soil conditions, you should have some huge brassicas if given the time to grow unless your deer herd numbers are too high. Just a thought.
 
My experience with both PTT and GHR is that you don't need that long of a growing season to get maximum leaf growth. I find that planting earlier significantly increases the size of the tubers but not the tops.

Thanks,

Jack
 
Tap, My brassicas normally get hit hard when the lower browse / leaves fall off the trees. Which is normally about our first fall frost date, around the 10th of November. I use this date, 10 November, back up 90 days and plant my brassicas. My question to you is, when are you planting in SW PA? For SW PA, I would guess your first frost and leaf drop is around the 15th-30th of September. If you back up from those dates, you should be planting around the 4th of July or a bit earlier. With proper rain, fertilization and soil conditions, you should have some huge brassicas if given the time to grow unless your deer herd numbers are too high. Just a thought.
I normally try to plant brassica in mid July, but that can be a crap shoot with getting adequate rain during that period...so the seed could sit there not germinating for a couple weeks. But as far as back dating from the frost, then mid July is good here.
However, I did an experimental, early brassica plot this year. I planted a variety of brassica in early June. The deer did delay eating it slightly. I figure probably because there was other high quality forage available. But, by the time the brassica was starting to look like a "real" plant (early July I guess), the deer kept it eaten down to almost nothing.
It's not my planting date and it's not my fertility. It's not really even high deer numbers, which we do have. There is other high quality forage right beside the brassica for them to eat. They just like the stuff and they eat it early and eat it hard...it's just the way it is here.

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I can sorta relate to what tap is saying I have one brassica plot that got hit somewhat in the early summer/fall and another plot same mix 50 acres away that was planted 2 weeks later but got hit extremely hard early summer/fall. Thank god we had a good acorn crop or that plot would have been toast. I don’t think it’s a fertility issue because based on tubers the second plot never got as big. I think it has more to do with what stage the plant is in when the deer find it. For me I noticed my brassicas take about 1 week to germinate, 2 weeks to show good coverage, week 3 they seem to leaf out some around week 4/5 they shoot up a good 8-12 inches. If they can get past that stage, they seem to have a good shot. It’s just what I have noticed
 
The deer hammer my brassicas around mid August, and will eat them until the tops are completely gone, they will get about 2 feet tall, then wham, they are down to the dirt by labor day. I will get baseball size bulbs, and decent sized tubers, that get chewed on as well, then slowly dig them up as the fall rolls along. I have since learned to spread winter rye into my diminishing brassica plot about mid August to Labor Day, so something is growing in the plot in the fall, and the winter rye will come up in the spring, and control weeds until I replant radish and turnips over the the first couple weeks of July again.
 
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