Letting your grains go to seed?

[SWIFFY]

Im just curious.... We all plant a lot of small grains in the fall for their lush green attractiveness, but does anyone plant Rye, wheat, barley, triticale, oats or whatever for the seed to go into fall/winter?
I never have and I dont know why? Just because no one says its work doing?

I remember i was up in Saskatchewan some years ago shed hunting and there was a standing wheat field left in, there were hundreds of deer in it eating and bedding and we found a bunch of sheds. Why doesnt anyone plot this way?

A shorter crop like oats.... what if you planted oats in mid-summer and then broadcasted your rye or even brassicas in the standing oats in late summer? Maybe youd loose all the seed by fall anyway, I dont know. I just think the seed of small grain would be attractive to deer in late season but ive never heard of anyone planting it?

Maybe im missing something? Anyone do this?

 

[yoderjac]

Like most things, it depends on your objectives. I generally don't let my WR head out. When I use it for a nurse crop for clover, I'm more interested in getting the clover established as weed-free as possible and mowing the WR back when it hits a foot or so. When I use WR as part of a cover crop into standing beans or as part of a fall plant, I'm looking for attraction that fall and early spring food until I plant for summer. I'm far enough south that our summer stress period is usually worse than our winter stress period, so I'm killing the cover crop to plant my warm season annuals.

From time to time, I'll decide to let an individual field go fallow for a year or two. In that case, I will let the WR head-out and stand. I would describe deer use of the seed heads as light. It certainly provides cover for deer and other game. As the WR falls down over time, turkey use the seed. Some of it will resprout in the fall.

In general, I'd say cereal is most efficient for deer use (attraction and nutrition) when it is young and supple in the fall through early the next spring when it becomes much less desirable. If you let it grow and stand until the next fall, it is providing little food for deer during that time. If you are up north and summer is not a stress period for your deer, the lack of nutrition during the summer doesn't matter. However come fall, if you mow the WR and cultipack so the seed germinates, you produce a lot more food and attraction for fall and winter than the seed heads would provide if you let it stand. On the other hand, you remove cover.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[SWIFFY]

Yeah I see a big difference from north tho south, like youre saying Jack. I plant my Rye about Sept 1st here in MN, its 6-8 tall by October 1st and the deer just crush it down to the dirt. If I just let my rye go to seed the following year, and then reseeded Rye back into it on sept 1st, would I be able to get the best of both worlds? The grain from last years with the new growth of this years underneath? I would like to have the grain heads for winter. I suppose one or the other would suffer. Im trying to "have my cake and eat it too". I might have to play around with some test spots.

 

[S.T.Fanatic]

Planting an awnless variety is what I would do in that situation. I’d also try planting a winter pea into it when you are seeding in the fall.

One year I had a thick strip of 6 row winter barley with a halfway decent crop of icicle winter peas that climbed up the barley. Once the barley and peas matured the heads and pods were all gone in a matter of days. (1/4 acre strip at most) which is fine because about the time tat happened I was ready to plant my brassica into them anyway.


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[yoderjac]

Yeah I see a big difference from north tho south, like youre saying Jack. I plant my Rye about Sept 1st here in MN, its 6-8 tall by October 1st and the deer just crush it down to the dirt. If I just let my rye go to seed the following year, and then reseeded Rye back into it on sept 1st, would I be able to get the best of both worlds? The grain from last years with the new growth of this years underneath? I would like to have the grain heads for winter. I suppose one or the other would suffer. Im trying to "have my cake and eat it too". I might have to play around with some test spots.

Yes, if I was up north and did not need to plant for summer food, I would probably do something similar for grains, but carbs become more important in the north. Here, soybeans are a summer food and deer ignore my pods unless we have a mast crop failure. Beans and corn in the north provide winter foods. For me, the PTT in my cover crop is a winter food. Location makes a difference.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[NT179]

I was just thinking, would mowing strips through your cereals give the best of two worlds. You would have cover from what you had left standing and new lush growth from the mowing.

 

[SD51555]

Yeah I see a big difference from north tho south, like youre saying Jack. I plant my Rye about Sept 1st here in MN, its 6-8 tall by October 1st and the deer just crush it down to the dirt. If I just let my rye go to seed the following year, and then reseeded Rye back into it on sept 1st, would I be able to get the best of both worlds? The grain from last years with the new growth of this years underneath? I would like to have the grain heads for winter. I suppose one or the other would suffer. Im trying to "have my cake and eat it too". I might have to play around with some test spots.

If they're that hard on it, I'd bump up your planting date to August 15th and go half oats in your mix. I've planted rye as early as July 1st, and it just stopped at about that 8" mark. Oats on the other hand will go as long as they can accumulate heat units. The fall tonnage will significantly outyield the winter cereals.

I don't aim for seed heads. I'm chasing that 36" leafy forage height. That'll keep 'em busy for a few days longer. Varieties do matter if you're looking to stretch tonnage. Extra height, extra leaf width, and lower likelihood of heading out justify the $10/bag premium over VNS, IMO. Oats are not a first choice forage at my place, so they make a great later season attraction after the good stuff (beans, brassicas, clover, acorns) has been exhausted.

This guy shows them headed out. That isn't my aim. Look closely and you'll see the leaves are waist high on him.

 

[Bassattackr]

SWIFFY,
Going to do something similar at our place, albeit different timing. I have a section of beans along a field edge I'm overseeding with RWW Plot Topper and Jerry Oats / Awnless Winter Wheat. The edge is going fallow in the future to be early successional habitat / natives between a food plot and a block of timber.

Long story short - I'm letting the wheat head out for a spring/summer food plot of sorts before it goes fallow long term..