Impact Forage Collards

[Terrific_tom]

I am thinking of planting about an acre of Impact Forage Collards this spring. Any one have any experience with them?

 

[scott44]

I have never planted them but I was curious when were you were thinking of planting them, like a brassica mid summer for a fall plot or spring planting for a summer plot ?

 

[trampledbyturtles]

Planted throw and grow forage collards this fall. Got great germination and growth. Can't say I saw any browse pressure.

Might be cause it was a first time thing.
They were with radish, turnip, rye, oats, lentil. Everything else was down to bare dirt last time I checked, cameras showed 10-15 deer in the plot a night.

One thing I noticed was the leaves looked real leathery and tuff. Thinking it might of just been a case of they had better options to choose from so they left it be.

Will be trying it again.

Relatively cheap add for 1-2# / A,
And is a great candidate for tnm due to really small seed size.

 

[Terrific_tom]

I have never planted them but I was curious when were you were thinking of planting them, like a brassica mid summer for a fall plot or spring planting for a summer plot ?

Spring plant and just let them grow. I would hope they keep feeding deer until the snow gets to deep.

 

[Terrific_tom]

Well I planted a 1 acre experimental plot of Impact Forage Collards Memorial weekend. This stuff is growing like crazy. Should give me tons of feed for deer this fall. Here are some pics at 30 days.

 

[S.T.Fanatic]

I’m guessing my picky deer wouldn’t touch them for at least the first 3-5 years of planting. My plot would look live though.


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[Bassattackr]

Looks great! Keep us posted.

 

[jsasker007]

Looks good! Anything else planted with it?

 

[Terrific_tom]

Looks good! Anything else planted with it?

Straight planting of collards. I have soybeans planted adjacent to the collards.

 

[Honker]

Nice looking plot Tom! A good long season brassica. Green Cover Seed did a good comparison if you haven's seen it already.

 

[Terrific_tom]

Nice looking plot Tom! A good long season brassica. Green Cover Seed did a good comparison if you haven's seen it already.

The video comparison is what got me to try them. Also being able to spring plant and take advantage of the available moisture vs planting late July and praying for rain. If this works out I will be switching all my brassica plots to spring planted collards.

 

[BenA]

I'd be really interested to see if the deer used them during the summer too. Keep us updated on how it goes.

P.S. Are you the same Terrific_tom that used to build some of the homebrew cameras? I built a bunch of those back in the day and remember some really cool pictures from Terrific_tom.

 

[Terrific_tom]

I'd be really interested to see if the deer used them during the summer too. Keep us updated on how it goes.

P.S. Are you the same Terrific_tom that used to build some of the homebrew cameras? I built a bunch of those back in the day and remember some really cool pictures from Terrific_tom.

That would be me.

 

[Bassattackr]

Any update on these in terms of deer useage?

 

[CarolinaDawg]

Well I planted a 1 acre experimental plot of Impact Forage Collards Memorial weekend. This stuff is growing like crazy. Should give me tons of feed for deer this fall. Here are some pics at 30 days.

I’ve never grown a monoculture of forage collards, but they’ve been in some of my mixes. They grow well, but I’ve never seen evidence of browse. In my opinion they can play a roll in adding to the diversity of roots in the soil, but they don’t directly feed deer.
Please keep us updated on the browse you see in your plot. I’ll be following along. Thanks

 

[Terrific_tom]

My one acre test plot grew great until it got invaded with sedge grass. They still grew but the sedge took a lot of the nutrients/fertilizer away. The deer browsed them lightly during the summer months as I had soybeans planted next to them. I planted a brassica mix in two plots in late July and I put some collards that I had left over in that mix. As my beans turned yellow the deer really started hitting my brassicas and collards. By late October my brassica plots were almost browsed off. The collards in the mix were heavily browsed but kept pushing out new growth even when night time temps dropped below freezing once in a while. I will definitely be planting collards again. A couple things I will do different will be if I plant in Spring I will spray and kill all weeds and grasses before planting. Besides fertilizing when planting I will give 2nd dose of fertilizer in mid July. On my brassica mix which I plant in late July I will increase the amount of Collards and decrease the amount of rape in the mix because of the collard's ability to keep growing after being heavily browsed. I also am tossing the idea to plant straight collards in mid to late July as the growth you get in 30 to 45 days is unbelievable. This would give more time to kill all weeds and grasses before planting and I would only have to fertilize at time of planting.

 

[Terrific_tom]

Posts: 3,317 Likes: 3,387 Location: NE Wisconsin / Hunt North Central Wisconsin Zone: 4A Member is Online

27 minutes ago QuoteEdit Post by terrifictom on 27 minutes ago​ I don't know if this is good or bad but my straight collard planting from last spring is starting to grow again. Deer are loving it.