Weedy clover throw and mow

[H80Hunter]

I’ve got a plot planted last fall in the LC Cereal mix. This year, the plot is mostly mature rye, and a mix of the medium red and jumbo ladino clovers I planted last fall as part of the mix. The issue is there’s a good amount of ragweed and some black medic growing throughout the plot.

I want to throw and mow just rye and clover this fall. Would you spray to kill the black medic and ragweed? I hate to nuke all that good clover mixed in.

Thoughts?

 

[SoInHunter]

I am in the same situation. My plot is 4-5' tall ragweed, foxtail and mature rye with lots of clover underneath. I'm going to nuke it with a heavy dose of gly and throw and roll half in brassicas and half cereal grain. I figure a lot of spray won't make it down to the clover and If it does the clover should bounce back anyway.
If the clover does die I will still have all my brassicas and cereal mix

 

[MickT]

You can probably clip the ragweed to keep it from going to seed. No suggestions right off the top of my head on the medic since it is also a legume.

That said, ragweed is very commonly browse by deer, and there’s much worse weeds you could be dealing with. If I had a good stand of clover in there, I’d let it ride.


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[Crimson n' Camo]

I'd let it go. The other plants are likely providing the clover with a little shade.

 

[pointer]

I planted a plot in fall of '16 with WR/clover via Throw/Roll/Spray. By Labor Day '17 it still had a lot of good stuff it in, but also had a lot of weeds. I did a Throw/Roll with more WR/Clover. The clover did extremely well and continues to do well. The WR establishment wasn't as good as the previous year, but I think that's due to the well established clover. I'd not think that a spray would be a bad thing, but I'm not sure it necessary.

Fall '16, 20days after the Throw/Roll/Spray.
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr

May '17
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr

Labor Day '17 (Throw/Roll Seeded into this)
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr

End of Sept '17
Untitled by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr
DSCN2199 by Tyler Staggs, on Flickr

 

[Tap]

The issue is there’s a good amount of ragweed and some black medic growing throughout the plot.

I want to throw and mow just rye and clover this fall. Would you spray to kill the black medic and ragweed? I hate to nuke all that good clover mixed in.

Thoughts?

I never try to kill ragweed. My deer love it. A few years ago I had an E fence around a bean field but the ragweed took hold in there it had spots that were 50-50 ragweed:beans.
When I removed the fence, the deer completely ate the ragweed before they touched the beans. But once the ragweed was gone the beans did het hammered.

 

[NorthPotter]

You could try some IMOX on the ragweed rather than glyphosate. Although the deer do browse ragweed here too, if I don't control the ragweed in my clover plots it will completely dominate the plot in 2-3 years time and the clover will disappear.

 

[yoderjac]

I’ve got a plot planted last fall in the LC Cereal mix. This year, the plot is mostly mature rye, and a mix of the medium red and jumbo ladino clovers I planted last fall as part of the mix. The issue is there’s a good amount of ragweed and some black medic growing throughout the plot.

I want to throw and mow just rye and clover this fall. Would you spray to kill the black medic and ragweed? I hate to nuke all that good clover mixed in.

Thoughts?

Nope! Deer don't care about weeds. They are browsers. Many broadleaf weeds provide excellent nutrition for deer. I find my perennial clover plots look like nothing but weed fields during the summer, but when I mow right before the season and the cool evenings and rain begin to favor the clover, it takes over the field again. In many cases a field of say pure ladino would go completely dormant in the summer. In a weedy ladino field, much of the clover would be shaded by the weeds and often has more actively growing clover during the summer months under the weeds than the monoculture field.

Keep in mind the big picture. Throw and Mow and the many variants are tools in a bigger strategy of sustainability. You are improving soil health, improving nutrient cycling reducing fertilizer cost, and providing a quality food source for deer and other wildlife over the long haul. Because cost and time are reduced, you are improving the Biological Carrying Capacity of the land over many years. It is an approach that lightly bends nature to favor wildlife rather than the short-term domination caused by traditional farming techniques. They can provide a short term lush food source, but if you don't continue to provide high cost inputs, and stop, the result is a decrease in BCC in the long-run on that portion of land as the natural soil biology has been decimated and natural nutrient cycling has been interrupted.

There are problematic weeds that need to be dealt with and some level of weed control is needed from time to time to establish a throw and mow plot. Having said that, the goal is to manage weeds not eliminate them from your field. So, you need to assess the field over time and see if it is accomplishing your goal for feeding deer. If so, ignore the weeds. If not, it is time to control them.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Tap]

And keep in mind that the age of the weed has a lot to do with its level of attractiveness to deer.
3 weeds that I get in my clover is clearweed, hairy galensoga, and ragweed. None of those get touched by my deer until they get a little more mature. I used to get bent out of shape when I saw those weeds in my plot because it didn't seem like the deer utilized them but as those weeds matured, the deer started browsing on them heavily.

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[Crimson n' Camo]

Pointer.....That field looks awesome!

 

[S.T.Fanatic]

Pointer.....That field looks awesome!

Agreed! Question I have is when and how did you go about planting the oats?

 

[pointer]

Pointer.....That field looks awesome!

Thanks! It was your thread that gave me the confidence to give it a try. Time this fall is going to be very short as we'll be moving (closer to Camp!), but all my plots will probably get a dose of WR and Clover seed again this fall. If the weeds aren't too bad/big I may scalp a few strips with my weedeater to see if I can get a better take by the WR.

All the seeds were broadcast. The clover by a hand spreader and the WR/Oats by a tow behind seeder pulled by my UTV. Then everything cultipacked. My boys like to drive the UTV, so sometimes things get very cultipacked... :D

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

The biggest thing that I still see folks struggling with is looking at a summer plot that looks like yours and seeomg at it as a success. It seems like the vast majority of folks…(even those that have moved to a no-till method…T&M type method)…..look at a field like yours and see it as “weeds in my clover”. I’ve seen the same exact thing said over and over……”My clover looks awesome underneath it all but there’s a ton of weeds! What do I need to do!?!?!”…….The only thing you need to do is re-read the first part of your statement over and over and leave the plot alone.

 

[pointer]

Exactly! If clover is there and the deer want some clover, they'll find it under those weeds. I'm pretty much over worrying about my plots being 'clean'.

FWIW, the deer on the left in the above picture was shot by my 7yo with its feet in the clover and it's snout in an overhead weed taking a nibble! :D

 

[scott44]

Exactly! If clover is there and the deer want some clover, they'll find it under those weeds. I'm pretty much over worrying about my plots being 'clean'.

FWIW, the deer on the left in the above picture was shot by my 7yo with its feet in the clover and it's snout in an overhead weed taking a nibble! :D

My thoughts also, my deer don't seem to care.

 

[yoderjac]

These last several posts are spot on and demonstrate the difference between farming and managing for wildlife. Monocultures in farming are largely driven by cost of production and harvest. Food plots for wildlife management are closer to (but not identical) to planting for livestock and grazing. Here, a field may be planted with a combination of clover and orchard grass (for cattle not deer) and last for many, many years. Much more acreage is required (or livestock is rotated) but once planted, nature governs. Nutrients are cycled as animals consume vegetation and defecate back. A diversity of plants including weeds grow in the field over time.

Now, deer are not grazers like cattle, they are browsers. So, we might include a complementary plant like chicory instead of orchard grass. Because only a small part of their diet comes from the field, we may need to mow once or twice a year since they are free ranging and have other options unlike cattle. Because of this highly varied diet of plants, they don't require mineral supplements since each kind of plant has different mineral mining and storage abilities.

Diversity of habitat with fields, and multiple successions of timber in proximity is king for wildlife management. Having the fields provide quality food during times when nature is stingy is the key, not having an abundance of some beautiful highly nutritious monoculture when nature is plentiful. Who cares if a deer is eating a quality food we provide or one provided by nature? We only care that the deer has a quality food available for as much of the year as possible.

This kind of management is low cost and can even provide a positive cash flow, but requires scale and a significant amount of land. It is quite different than managing for improved hunting. In some cases, hunting is tougher because deer are not forced by their stomachs to expose themselves for food. If you would die suddenly and stop this management, deer would not be hurt. Slowly, over years, nature would take over and perhaps the BCC would revert to some extent, but deer populations would adjust slowly over time to compensate. With intense farming type management, if you stop, the quality food availability diminishes quickly and deer populations can crash.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Rit]

Here are a few weeds in a clover plot.

 

[Tap]

View attachment 19612View attachment 19613
Here are a few weeds in a clover plot.

Your clover looks a lot like mine with some of the "good weeds".
The 1st one is ragweed. Rag is like a few other weeds, in that deer don't really utilize it until it starts to mature a little bit. We see weeds like this in our plots when they are young and deer aren't using them and we panic and think we need to kill it. Have patience, the deer will use it in later summer when a lot of our planted, annual forages are in dormancy.
I have that 2nd weed also, and it too doesn't get browsed until it's more mature. I know what it is but I just can't remember right now...maybe one of the asters??

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Is the second one goldenrod???

 

[Yarg]

I believe that is Daisy fleabane.