WR Thatch Issues

strawhead

5 year old buck +
Last fall was our first year planting LC cereal grain mix. Tried two plots, 1 at low end rye rate and 1 nearing upper rate. We have fairly heavy soil and have always incorporated tilling before planting.(Trying to talk one son into trying less tilling) We had 6ft tall WR. We have a 6ft reverse till land pride tiller. Other than a complete no till(broadcast) of LC brassica into the standing WR and clover, is there any way to get away from having shaft of tiller fill with rye stalks? I have tried to include pics from my computer files, but this 60yr old, all thumbs guy has to wait for some help with that.

WR was cut with a brush hog. Tried single cut, 2 cut , and 3 cut but no difference between them. All of them have long rye stems that tractor tires ran over. We have an 8ft-3pt disc that we tried to cut up stems and do anything. NO DIFFERENCE.

We got the low end rate, 3/4 acre plot done, but with plugging of the tiller 5 times. 1 hour to cut out the wrapped up stems each time. I am concerned about damaging the bearing opposite the drive side on the tiller besides the pain of cutting the wrapped stems.

I did not spray to terminate any thing?

We have another acre to do with the upper rate of WR?

Both plots had rye cut at top of clover last weekend.

Any ideas - experiences for the second plot with what we now have now left?

We have 2 more 1 acre spring oat - clover plots that we wanted to put into the LC cereal grain mix again, but are having second thoughts now?

Any reinforcing thoughts regarding a broadcast of brassica mix and terminating WR and clover that I can pass on to a 34yr old son that will help him understand that we should experiment with a couple different techniques terminating -planting?

Our previous 2 one acre plots of brassicas have been getting cleaned up by December for years now. We have gone from beans and corn to all LC mixes starting last year.

Thanks for any thoughts.
 
How about burning first?
 
Do you have a cultipacker? If so try flattening the rye with it and broadcast your seed just before a rain.
 
Don't till it with the tiller, u will break it.
You need more weight on the disc. Making a platform and adding rocks will give you weight. Logs are another option.
You disc up the rye a little, you will really be helping your rye germination. Don't over disc it, you still want a lot of that thatch showing. That thatch will protect your soil, and you won't be discing the seed in too deep. You will have it overseeded, but that's fine, the price of the seed was right.
I would also broadcast some oats, maybe some wheat and make a couple passing with the disc after that. Don't forget some brassicas and peas. Go light on some red clover too.
You might be freaking out now straw, but you are in a good place. I was in the same place you were. I couldn't even get a disc back to this spot the rye was matured. I was pulling and cutting rye out of my tiller cursing the earth. Im sure you had some good spats with your boys, I know tempers were high when we were hating that rye.
I basically flattened it like its been said, and life got a whole lot simpler and cheaper, after that!
 
Here's what I got for the discing vs just flattening. Discing will give you immediate rye germination. The plants will be strong and mature out nicely.
Rye will germinate with even touching the ground. It does need increased moisture. Depending on moisture it will germinate, but it will be uneven. That isn't a bad thing. Last year for example, I didn't get a lot of flattened germination until November. It workerd out great because I used a conventional drill to drill on oats In July. So I had nice tall oats to extend usage deep into winter, and nice tender young rye. I still haven't noticed any difference between taller and tender rye. This year I'm adding wheat.
 
Thanks everybody. Yes, we do have a cultipacker. The burning thing SCARES me. Won't do it. Our plots are bordering to much northern forest land. The biggest concern is from the son.
Our plots have done so well with the tilling process that he has fear of failure with minimum till and broadcasting. I have been following dipper here, and the other place, along with dgallow and everyone else promoting less tillage.

Will LC brassica mix be able to hold its own if the mowed rye germinates again? Our rye was not ripe, but it was headed out for some time now.

I'm not sure we can hold deer near our food plots for the entire winter. This year with turnips, radishes, and WR we had deer into mid Dec. Then they left. Had lots of green WR left, but deer left. I don't know if they learn food is available 365 days a year they will hang closer or not. Time will tell.

We had about 2 acres of WR, oats, radishes, clover last fall. One acre planted 3rd week of July and other acre planted 1st week of Aug. None of our oats got tall enough to stay above the snow last winter. We are going to get that cereal grain mix in ASAP to try to get more growth on the oats.

I got him a little interested in this website, and we are going to try some broadcasting on a portion on the mowed-disked WR.

Our number one goal is get the deer in the best shape we can going into winter. Again , this year it appears our does and even last years fawns came thru the winter somewhat ok. Better than I thought they would. Our bucks did not fare so well I fear.

We don't have your over population her dipper, but I think we are still better than some of you guys in MN.
 
Hopefully a couple pics of start of WR terminating. 7-10-14 Hill RYE (28).JPG 7-10-14 Hill RYE (31).JPG
 
that is some tall and thick rye, and nice lush clover underneath. was this your "lower" rate of rye plot?
 
No not "lower", this was the "higher" rate application. I will try to get some pics of the "lower" rate shown.
 
Here is pic of the "low" end rate.7-10-14 RD Rye (21).JPG
 
Is your blind so ugly you had to blot it out?
 
Yeh, let's go with that. :)
 
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