Winter Rye/ Winter Wheat/ Oates Mixture

[Joe Buck]

How many lbs. per acre of each for a sandy soil plot in Central Wis. Thanking you in advance for a reply. We are planting Aug. 26

 

[4wanderingeyes]

Honestly, I put a bag of each on 3/4 acres.

 

[yoderjac]

You can mix in any proportion you like. Total cereal component of a mix can be in the 60 to 100 lbs/ac range. Consider adding a legume.

 

[Tree Spud]

What are you objectives?

Wouldn't waste my time on oats. No value. Wheat the same way. You have tough droughty soils there. On an acre I would do 2 bushels of WR and 2 -3 lbs of red clover.

Clover may not perform this year but WR & clover will be there in the spring.

 

[Joe Buck]

We are trying to establish a couple perennial plots totaling about 1 acre. we have 4 other plots totaling about another 1 acre and that is what where we were just going to plant the WR/WW/Oates for late fall, early winter and have the WR/WW for next spring. Are you suggesting just using WR/ Medium Red Clover for everything?

 

[bbcoach]

Oats are a grain that will die as soon as you get temps around 20 degrees. That is only going to give you about a month of growing time in your area. If you want a perennial plot, I would suggest planting a combo of 50/50 WW and WR and whatever clover grows well in your area and soil type. I'm a Durana guy but I'm not sure if Durana will make it through your cold winters. Talk with some of your local buddies or local garden shops and get some info on clovers for your area. The WW and WR will definitely feed this fall and into early spring and the clover can get a chance to take off next spring. Good Luck.

 

[4wanderingeyes]

I am north of you, and my oats make it into October. The deer pretty much eat it to the ground though, but if you cage off an area, it will get about 6-8 inches. But it get the deer interested into coming into the plot, while the wr, and ww don’t have the attractant that the oats have. For the $4 for a bushel of oats, I say it is money well spent.

If your goal is to have clover in the plot, then by all means get clover in now, then plant wr in a few weeks.

 

[Tree Spud]

We are trying to establish a couple perennial plots totaling about 1 acre. we have 4 other plots totaling about another 1 acre and that is what where we were just going to plant the WR/WW/Oates for late fall, early winter and have the WR/WW for next spring. Are you suggesting just using WR/ Medium Red Clover for everything?

I prefer WR over WW because of it's nitrogen affixing, alleopthic effects (weed suppression), and cold hardiness (will germinate down to 32 F). When all other greens are dying because of frost it stays green.

As stated above, pick the clover best suited for your area. I mix white & red and use alcise for wetter areas.

 

[SWIFFY]

I am north of you, and my oats make it into October. The deer pretty much eat it to the ground though, but if you cage off an area, it will get about 6-8 inches. But it get the deer interested into coming into the plot, while the wr, and ww don’t have the attractant that the oats have. For the $4 for a bushel of oats, I say it is money well spent.

If your goal is to have clover in the plot, then by all means get clover in now, then plant wr in a few weeks.

Im with you. I plant a lot or WR and love it... but id add in the oats as well. Im in Central MN and also find that the deer prefer them before the WR. At the end of the fall its all gone anyway.

 

[swat1018]

I agree with Rye being great, although it doesn't fix nitrogen. I plant at least 100# / ac rye, throw in 40#/ac oats, 5# / ac radish, and the clover of your choice. I use a lot of medium red, but if you want a perennial white clover plot, plant it with the grain cover crop. I usually add in any leftover soybeans I have laying around. They don't last as long as the oats even, but they love them till they freeze out. You can't put down too much cereal grain...

 

[Terrific_tom]

I had real good luck with 50 pounds of winter wheat, 50 pounds of oats, 50 pounds of winter rye and 40 pounds of winter peas per acre. Deer loved it. You can either mix some clover at planting or frost seed in late winter/early spring.

 

[yoderjac]

I agree with Rye being great, although it doesn't fix nitrogen. I plant at least 100# / ac rye, throw in 40#/ac oats, 5# / ac radish, and the clover of your choice. I use a lot of medium red, but if you want a perennial white clover plot, plant it with the grain cover crop. I usually add in any leftover soybeans I have laying around. They don't last as long as the oats even, but they love them till they freeze out. You can't put down too much cereal grain...

Yes, WR doe a lot of great things, but fixing N is not one of them. That privilege goes to the legumes in our mix. Paul Knox had a great thread on WR verses other cereal grains. There is no significant deer preference between cereal grains at my place other than the fact that they each peak at slightly different times. Given that, I don't bother to mix cereal grains. WR has so many beneficial characteristics over the other cereal grains for soils that I just stick with it for my cereal component.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[wiscwhip]

I think what Tree Spud meant was rye's ability to scavenge N via it's deep root system bringing it to the surface and storing it within the tissues of the plant to be released and used after the dead plant material breaks down, thus his use of the word "affixing". Surely, this may or may not be construed as being similar to what we view legumes as doing, because they too are considered to "affix" N due to the fact they collect free N from the atmosphere and "affix" it to the root nodules via a symbiotic relationship with the rhizobium bacteria, albeit the legume/rhizobium relationship is a FAR better vector for "creating" added N in the soil vs the "scavenging" effect of cereal rye. "Affixing" may have been a curious use of the word where and how it was used, but it depends on how you view it I guess, because in the end, rye does something very similar to legumes in the fact that it takes free N (via it leaching deep out of the normal root zone of most plants) and pulls it to the surface for later use, much like legumes taking free N from the air and storing it in the roots near the surface for future use.

 

[4wanderingeyes]

While I will agree with the theory that wr digs deep for its nutrients, including N, I am not to sure there would be any built up in the plant to break down into the soil later, being it consumes nitrogen in the soil when it breaks down. Now wr does a great job bringing up other nutrients to the top to be used at a later time, its just wr seems to consume more N to break down, then it would bring to the top to make the soil better for a later planting. I know if I add N to the wr it really takes off in the fall, and the deer hammer it after adding the N to it.

 

[wiscwhip]

I submit the following from Michigan State University's Extension website for your viewing pleasure....

http://msue.anr.msu.edu/news/cover_crops_and_nitrogen_scavenging


Note the line about N being available to "be released and used by the subsequent crop". Again, as I said in the previous post, this affect is not nearly as good as the legume/rhizobium combination at providing N for future use, but the affect is the same, just via different vectors and in differing quantities.

 

[S.T.Fanatic]

It is the perfect slow release fertilizer.

 

[4wanderingeyes]

I stand corrected! But I have to wonder how much will actually be stored for future use, rather then consumed during decomposing. I am just referring to the N, and not all of the other minerals. I use wr in all of my food plots. I spread it in all of my plots the 1st week of September. It is great for soil health, it adds a lot of organic matter, reaches deep and draws up many nutrients, then deters weeds in the spring, and feeds deer from September through May. Unless it is buried in more then a foot of snow.

 

[yoderjac]

I think what Tree Spud meant was rye's ability to scavenge N via it's deep root system bringing it to the surface and storing it within the tissues of the plant to be released and used after the dead plant material breaks down, thus his use of the word "affixing". Surely, this may or may not be construed as being similar to what we view legumes as doing, because they too are considered to "affix" N due to the fact they collect free N from the atmosphere and "affix" it to the root nodules via a symbiotic relationship with the rhizobium bacteria, albeit the legume/rhizobium relationship is a FAR better vector for "creating" added N in the soil vs the "scavenging" effect of cereal rye. "Affixing" may have been a curious use of the word where and how it was used, but it depends on how you view it I guess, because in the end, rye does something very similar to legumes in the fact that it takes free N (via it leaching deep out of the normal root zone of most plants) and pulls it to the surface for later use, much like legumes taking free N from the air and storing it in the roots near the surface for future use.

And, of course, it is scavenging many more nutrients and micro-nutrients than just N. This is also a case for deep rooted cover crops like GHR that scavenge nutrients as well as performing organic tillage.

 

[Barndog56]

4wanderingeyes, what exactly is consuming the nitrogen during decomposition?

 

[Tree Spud]

I think what Tree Spud meant was rye's ability to scavenge N via it's deep root system bringing it to the surface and storing it within the tissues of the plant to be released and used after the dead plant material breaks down, thus his use of the word "affixing". Surely, this may or may not be construed as being similar to what we view legumes as doing, because they too are considered to "affix" N due to the fact they collect free N from the atmosphere and "affix" it to the root nodules via a symbiotic relationship with the rhizobium bacteria, albeit the legume/rhizobium relationship is a FAR better vector for "creating" added N in the soil vs the "scavenging" effect of cereal rye. "Affixing" may have been a curious use of the word where and how it was used, but it depends on how you view it I guess, because in the end, rye does something very similar to legumes in the fact that it takes free N (via it leaching deep out of the normal root zone of most plants) and pulls it to the surface for later use, much like legumes taking free N from the air and storing it in the roots near the surface for future use.

Thanks Wis, that is what I was kinda, sorta, tryin to say.

So many people come on here looking for the silver bullet food plot solution. They will spend $200 per acre on BOB seed when for $20-$25 they can plant the easiest to plant, best soil building, best fall to spring, most desirable food plot solution ... WR & clover. Plant whatever you want in the spring, but every fall over seed each acre with 50-75 lbs WR and 3-5 lbs of clover.