I have a question for the brain trust here.

[omicron1792]

I have planted about 10 acres of NWSG and forbs. Mix of big and little bluestem. Indian grass. And switchgrass. As well as many forbs and flowers. Those areas are doing great.

I have probably 20 more acres of areas I have sprayed with herbicides to promote NWSG and forbs. Those areas have come back as monoculture of broomsedge with some forbs. Areas I burn also come back mainly broomsedge.

I am planting forbs in those areas with some light discing.

Now the question. Should I also throw some other native grasses in there also? What are the benefits of having multiple NWSG instead of just one? Truthfully the broomsedge looks awesome.

 

[SwampCat]

I am a little biased - I am not a big fan of nwsg. I dont see a lot of use of nwsg - and what little I do see - is mostly for cover. I think I would leave it as is. I have killed hundreds and hundreds of quail in broomsedge.

 

[West_Fork]

I would, not sure in your part of the world but where I am most often we do warm season and cool season grasses along with forbes as it helps create a longer season for green forage, makes it more resistant and resilient. If you are not irrigating, you are dependent on the weather and some years will favor some species. I like to create as much opportunity as possible.

 

[TreeDaddy]

I have planted about 10 acres of NWSG and forbs. Mix of big and little bluestem. Indian grass. And switchgrass. As well as many forbs and flowers. Those areas are doing great.

I have probably 20 more acres of areas I have sprayed with herbicides to promote NWSG and forbs. Those areas have come back as monoculture of broomsedge with some forbs. Areas I burn also come back mainly broomsedge.

I am planting forbs in those areas with some light discing.

Now the question. Should I also throw some other native grasses in there also? What are the benefits of having multiple NWSG instead of just one? Truthfully the broomsedge looks awesome.

gonna go Paul McCartney here....

.........speaking words of wisdom.......

bill

 

[356]

Broomsedge thrives in low-fertility, low-pH, and eroded soils and will thrive after a burn for several years. While it is a good species, for the best soil health moving from a monoculture to a mixed native culture would be ideal if the goal is habitat in general. You are blessed with a NWSG field that is doing well, and this field, so I would not be overly concerned, and if you do something, consider 10 acres at a time.

 

[Native Hunter]

I am a fan of tall NWSGs. In some places broomsedge is fairly tall, but Indian, switch and big blue are taller. Also, even though deer don’t eat much grass, they do browse new tender growth in the shooting lanes I mow. Broomsedge is the least palatable of the grasses that I mentioned, so having others could be a plus. I would rather have other NWSGs mixed in, but they will be hard to establish if the broonsedge is thick and well established.

 

[KY wild]

A Little input from my experience. I planted NWSG about 20 years ago and I have mixed emotions about how good it is for wildlife. With that said the grasses have spread and took over several acres of adjacent fields. On the other hand it has not moved to fields separated by much space or be woods, this tells me that it probably spreads by wind and not so much animals. So if it was me I would plant 10 acres of WSG in the middle of a 20 acre and leave the rest in forbs and over time the native grass will spread on its own.

 

[Bill]

A Little input from my experience. I planted NWSG about 20 years ago and I have mixed emotions about how good it is for wildlife. With that said the grasses have spread and took over several acres of adjacent fields. On the other hand it has not moved to fields separated by much space or be woods, this tells me that it probably spreads by wind and not so much animals. So if it was me I would plant 10 acres of WSG in the middle of a 20 acre and leave the rest in forbs and over time the native grass will spread on its own.

My experience also. I’ve noticed Indian grass is the one that spreads the most. Not sure why. Maybe the seed has more chaff and catches the wind the best.

 

[SwampCat]

This section of my open ground was nwsg - mostly little blue with some indian and gamma grass mixed it. It becomes becomes so dense, very few forbs are present. In this particular section - about three acres - there was a lot of persimmon, cedar, and honey locust encroaching on the area - along with much ash. I had bush hogged, I had disked, I had sprayed with cleth, and then I sprayed with gly - and still the nwsg choked everything out - except persimmon, honey locust, and cedar

I finally sprayed with some blazer and gly and it looked like I had burned it - for months. That was 18 months ago. It is now all kinds of wildflowers, regular annual ragweed, white and yellow sweet clover, marsh elder - and others.

Compared to a nwsg habitat - it is now thriving with wildlife - birds of all types - pollinators, rabbits, deer feed and bed in it. I have a couple of other 2 acre sections of nwsg - one I am trying to leave as is. Those areas just never have much diversity - or wildlife.

Granted, I do not have the green thumb that Native has. This is calcareous, white, poor soil, high ph. It seems all my previous efforts to incorporate some diversity in the nwsg last a year and the grass takes right back over.

I dont know what the future path of the section of field is pictured above. I am sure it will tend towards nwsg again - but I dont know how long that will take.

Lord knows, I do not need more cover. Being from Alabama, Omicron’s land may be largely cover, also. I have a fond spot in my heart for broomsedge. I have killed up to 200 quail in a single season back when I kept bird dogs - and back when we had quail. We didnt hunt old fields and fence rows - we hunted 100% commercial timberland clearcuts in early succession - a LOT of broom grass as we called it.

 

[Native Hunter]

I took these pics a few days ago. Even after more than 15 years I still get a lot of forbs in my stand. The problem here is keeping blackberry from taking over.

The second pic below is an area of a field that is almost entirely forbs. I do nothing different there.

 

[SwampCat]

I took these pics a few days ago. Even after more than 15 years I still get a lot of forbs in my stand. The problem here is keeping blackberry from taking over.

The second pic below is an area of a field that is almost entirely forbs. I do nothing different there.

View attachment 83303
View attachment 83304

I think I remember you said you dont burn, you dont spray to thin nwsg? How often do you mow, if ever?

 

[West_Fork]

I don't know about anything east of Colorado, but I did a personal project some years ago that included enough native forb seed to cover 10 acres or so if Aspen Forest, on the heavy side. That seed cost over $1600.

 

[Native Hunter]

I think I remember you said you dont burn, you dont spray to thin nwsg? How often do you mow, if ever?

I mow once a year just before fawning time. Then late summer I mow my shooting lanes.

 

[SwampCat]

I mow once a year just before fawning time. Then late summer I mow my shooting lanes.

Do you mow all of it every year - with no three year rotation or anything like that?

 

[Native Hunter]

Do you mow all of it every year - with no three year rotation or anything like that?

Under the program I was in it was a rotation, but my guy at the ASCS office told me if I saw a brier patch or something like that which needed to be mowed I could do a little more. Now that my CREP has ended I’m mowing all once a year rather than a rotation like I did before.

 

[ksJoe]

@SwampCat are you trying to suppress NWSG to promote forbs?

I wonder about using Fusilade ii for that. I don't know enough to recommend one way or the other, but it might be worth a look. I have some for suppressing Bermuda in Fescue turf. There's a small window of time where the right application rate will put serious hurt on the bermuda and only stress the Fescue a little. When applied more heavily (or in warm weather), it wipes out most grasses while leaving most non-grasses alone. I was revisiting the label recently hoping to find something that would leave the NWSG alone while wiping out Johnson grass (no luck with Fusilade ii).

It's expensive, but goes a long ways. For bermuda crontrol in Fescue, I apply 0.07 ounce per 1,000 sq feet.

 

[buckdeer1]

Broomsedge is a weed and can be fertilized so that something else overtakes it.I backed out of renewing my last CRP because they were going to inspect for forbs every 2 years.Issue I had was it was a wetland program with heavy NWSG if it hadn't flooded in a few years. They didn't understand that either the heavy stand of NWSG or flood water would come close to wiping any forbs out so then I would have to re drill forbs seed and they were only paying around 40.00 per acre.

 

[Turkish]

I have planted about 10 acres of NWSG and forbs. Mix of big and little bluestem. Indian grass. And switchgrass. As well as many forbs and flowers. Those areas are doing great.

I have probably 20 more acres of areas I have sprayed with herbicides to promote NWSG and forbs. Those areas have come back as monoculture of broomsedge with some forbs. Areas I burn also come back mainly broomsedge.

I am planting forbs in those areas with some light discing.

Now the question. Should I also throw some other native grasses in there also? What are the benefits of having multiple NWSG instead of just one? Truthfully the broomsedge looks awesome.

I swear I remember dgallow talking about broom sedge being an awesome organic matter builder. Anybody remember that?

If I were you I’d be content if the broom sedge were the only grasses there. And I wouldn’t worry if they were pretty dominant. Grasses are for structure and not much more.

Have you tried varying your timing of burning?