My food plots are going underwater right now. Planted wheat and durana last fall. Water will kill the durana if it stays very long. Anyone have success planting duranA in the early spring and getting it to establish and make it through the summer and then taking off in the fall? Zone 8 - hot summers.
Planting Durana in the Spring?
- Thread starter SwampCat
- Start date
davidhelmly
5 year old buck +
I am in 8a and have had success with it. Several years back we planted about 8 acres of durana in early spring and to my surprise it did great and is still thriving. I have also overseeded with alice in late winter/early spring several times and had good luck but if it gets hot and dry too early you may be in trouble. As far as taking off in the fall, it's nothing like how it explodes in the spring unless you have a long cool and wet fall, we never have those it seems.
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yoderjac
5 year old buck +
It depends how weed tolerant you are. I don't plant perennial clover, especially Durana in the spring because it is so slow to establish. The problem is that while spring planted perennial clover is putting down roots, summer weeds take over the field. Best practice for me is to plant Durana in the fall with a WR nurse crop. The key for me is releasing the Durana the first spring. Each time the WR hits a foot or so, I mow it back to 6". This releases the durana without killing the WR. By the time the WR dies on its own, the Durana is pretty well established.
My advice is to plant buckwheat, oats, or some other crop to help with weed control in the spring and then plant your Durana the following fall. If you do decide to plant Durana in the spring, I would mix it with Patriot White. PW is much less persistent and drought tolerant but is much faster to establish. This may help with weeds.
I'm a pretty weed tolerant guy, but I find it is not worth the time and effort to plant Durana in the spring in my area (7A). I find I have to refurbish and rotate much sooner than if I plant in the fall. When I plant in the fall, I got almost no growth. A good percentage will germinate. The following spring, it gets a jump on weeds because it is already starting to put down roots while weed seed is just germinating. It is not until the following fall until it is fully established.
Thanks,
The durana and wheat combo plots were planted in the fall. The duranA is very small at this time. If water doesn’t stay up long, maybe it comes out of it. If it doesn’t, I would like something growing in the plots this summer. Deer will wipe out any peas or beans, I have bee hives so don’t want buckwheat. Maybe I go with an annual clover, but hot weather is going to limit usefulness.
yoderjac
5 year old buck +
I don't know what effect the standing water will have on your Durana. That my do it in. Annual clover (Crimson) with Buckwheat can be a good combination with high deer pressure. They use buckwheat but generally won't abuse it unless they have nothing else. Crimson acts as a reseeding annual in our area. The problem is that Crimson doesn't frost seed well and Buckwheat likes warmer soil temps. Hopefully your durana and WW will survive.
Thanks,
Jack
Northbound
5 year old buck +
Have you considered alsike clover? I've had it under water for weeks and it survives. I've heard strawberry clover works well too as it grows on long stems and floats on surface during floods. I haven't tried that one yet thou
Medium red clover does good when spring planted and peak production here is middle of June thur August.
At times I have observed deer preferring MRC over soybeans. Could have neen a security issue but the MRC was grazed down to 4 inches and the soybeans across the road were hardly touched.
At times I have observed deer preferring MRC over soybeans. Could have neen a security issue but the MRC was grazed down to 4 inches and the soybeans across the road were hardly touched.
Jordan Selsor
5 year old buck +
I planted clover in spring once and will never do that again. Weediest plot you ever did see.
Why no buckwheat with bees?
Buckwheat honey is the color of molasses. I can’t hardly sell the honey.
yoderjac
5 year old buck +
What does crimson clover honey look like? Hope it is as pretty as the crop!
yoderjac
5 year old buck +
Because it takes so long to establish. It is only slightly better than spring planting. It can be an effective way to fill in bare spots if you find them in a fall plant, but I is not a great way to establish Durana.
yoderjac
5 year old buck +
I'm not saying it can't be planted that way or that it can't be spring planted for that matter. I'm saying that the best practice is to fall plant it with a WR cover crop. All long-lived perennial clovers are slow to establish compared to annuals, but Durana is even slower than most perennials. Pennington sometimes recommends mixing it with Patriot White because it establishes much faster but is not as long-lived. The Durana eventually takes over. When I plant it for fall, it germinates but doesn't produce much more than that above ground. The fact that it is germinated already gives it an advantage over weeds and the WR shades out weeds (and can actually shade out the Durana if planted thick enough and you don't mow to release it). It is still spending more energy on root development than top growth during that first spring.
I have frost seeded it. It only does slightly better than spring planting it. It results in a weedy field for me. Keep in mind that you can start with a weedy field if you use herbicides, but I find the cost and effort is higher for the life of the field and the results are not as good.
Thanks,
jack
Honey bees are not able to work all clovers - but clover honey, in general, makes a fine, light honey. Some years, We have a lot of white and yellow sweet clover - and it makes my wife's favorite honey. White and yellow sweet clover were actually brought to this county from Europe to plant as bee pasture. To be honest, other than white and yellow sweet clover, my bees don't tend to work other clovers very well. I don't know if it is because there are other, more preferable plants available - or what the reason is. Yes, they do work them some - but you cant stand back and just hear a low hum like you do around white or yellow sweet clover or elm blooms, or some other plants.
Water came off my food plots after six days. It appears my clover is OK at this point. The food plots have a yellow look to them, but I think that is more the wheat than the clover. The clover is from this past fall's planting and is still only one to two inches tall. But, we still have a chance for flooding. If extended spring flooding occurs - there wont be a clover planting option.
Water came off my food plots after six days. It appears my clover is OK at this point. The food plots have a yellow look to them, but I think that is more the wheat than the clover. The clover is from this past fall's planting and is still only one to two inches tall. But, we still have a chance for flooding. If extended spring flooding occurs - there wont be a clover planting option.
yoderjac
5 year old buck +
I find your bee insight fascinating. My brother-in-law tried to establish bees a while back just south of Nashville. He ran into HOA issues in his development and ended up going in with a friend who had a farmette and some cattle. They got honey for a year or two then lost the colony. They were just learning, so I'm not sure what went wrong. It could have been whatever issue honey bees have been having lately.
At my farm in VA, I used to have a lot of honey bees in my white clover, and buckwheat. They were everywhere when I mowed. All of a sudden they disappeared. Since then, I see a lot more native mason bees working my clover and buckwheat, but not near the numbers when there were honey bees in my area.
Back to your plot... If the flooding only lasted 6 days and you don't get any more, I might consider a light frost seeding medium red over top your existing plot. It does not surprise or concern me that you don't see much clover. If the WW continues to look OK the clover is probably OK. Medium Red is a short-lived perennial and establishes much faster than Durana. It lasts about 2 years. It frost seeds well. If your Durana fails, you should have something. Given the flooding issues, I would completely avoid tillage. It will make things worse. This may not be the ideal location for a food plot. If you watch Ray the soil guys infiltration video, you can quickly see how tillage can make a flooding situation much worse.
Thanks,
Jack
I am attempting to establish the durana so I dont have to till anything in the years it doesnt flood. My land lies mostly in a flowage easement - so I really dont have much choice about food plot location - other than to sell out and move. I am attempting more throw and mow to reduce tillage - but so far, I have been unimpressed with that - but will still keep trying. I have some Imperial Whitetail clover that is eight years since planting - and has been flooded for up to sixty days at a time - and there is still some clover there - not great - but some. But, at any rate, sometimes you just have to make the best of it. My ground can be a maintenance nightmare when it comes to permanent deer food plots - but, I have duck hunted six out of the last seven days, hunting a different spot everyday - and not left my land. Have to take the good with the bad.
