D2o—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, July 2,1983
Ejß Brockeft's Ag Advice
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Forage Crops as Feed
The surest way to mishandle a
problem is to avoid facing up to it.
If there is one thing for sure in the
fanning business, it is that there
will be one problem after another.
Some of these problems could be
overcome or even avoided if the
farm manager did some advance
planning. Feed availability is one
of those that could be solved in
most years with some foresight.
Some people operate under the
premise that “experience” is
knowing a lot of things you
shouldn’t do. Others have more
success by realizing that ex
perience is knowing a lot of things
that have worked. Those who are
most successful combine the two
philosophies.
Emergency Crop
As livestock numbers grow in
relation to acres of crop land on a
farm, a farm manager must leam
to either produce more feed per
acre or be willing to purchase
more feed. One way to stretch the
feed supply is by producing so
called emergency crops. There are
usually annuals seeded now or
winter annuals seeded in Sep
tember.
The many sorghum-sudan
crosses are an excellent source of
feed as green chop or short term
silage. They will usually produce 4
to 6 tons of hay equivalent per acre
on well fertilized soil. They are
adaptible to a fairly wide range of
weather conditions, are relatively
insect resistant, and are their own
weed control mechanism. They
probably can not compete with
com or hay crops as a long term
souce of forage. Usually the
protein in the hybrid would be
nearly equal to that in well eared
corn silage but less than 50 percent
of that in good mixed grass-legume
haylage. Total nutrient content of
the hybrid would be 80 percenyir
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less of that in good corn silage and
90 percent or more of that in good
quality mixed haylage. As fresh
green chop, it has a high
palatibihty quotient for dairy
animals. It’s high moisture (may
be 85 percent or more) content
may limit its’ value for young
heifers.
Rye can be grown as a dual crop.
It makes very good fall pasture
and can be harvested for green
chop or silage in the spring. As
with sorghum-sudan hybrids, my
experience has been that it is
better as a green chop than as a
silage. If harvested in the grass to
milk stage, it has a protein content
that is 30 to 40 percent better than
com silage and 65 to 70 percent as
much as good mixed haylage.
Total nutrient level is usually
somewhat less than corn silage
and depending on maturity at
harvest can be equal to mixed
haylage. The total yield of rye for
forage is fairly low with from one
to one and a half tons of hay
equivalent per acre. Hay
equivalent means hay at 90 percent
dry matter. Fields producing rye
as a forage can usually be double
cropped. Perhaps some of the
fields would do better in sorghum
sudan hybrid now as the second
crop rather than corn.
Sudan grass is a good annual
pasture grass. Yields are not as
high as the sorghum-sudan cross
but prussic acid poisoning is not as
great of a danger either. We have
pastured heifers on it for several
years. They have always grown
well and looked good on Sudan
grass pasture. Most years we
graze it twice and often we have
come back in a third time. After
October first or the first killing
frost we'd let it grow and freeze
then pasture it after it was com
pletely dead.
ns
USDA requests comments on feed grain program
WASHINGTON, D.C. -
Secretary of Agriculture John K.
Block on June 22 called lor public
comment on some specifics of the
1984 feed gram program.
Block said the deadline for
comments is Aug. 23 which will
allow the U.S. Department of
Agriculture to study the public’s
recommendations along with
current data on U.S. and world
crop conditions and crop supply
and demand, before announcing
the 1984 program. He said his
current intentions are to announce
final program provisions by the
end of September which would be
well ahead of the Nov. 15 statutory
deadline.
Specifically USDA would like to
receive comments on; the loan and
purchase level; the established
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(target) price; the national
program acreage; whether there
should be a voluntary reduction
percentage and, if so, what per
centage; whether there should be
an acreage reduction program
and, if so, what percentage and
how will the acreage bases for the
acreage reduction program be
established; whether a set-aside
requirement is necessary and, if
so, what percentage; whether
there should be a payment-m-kind
(PIK) program and, if so, the PIK
program provisions that should be
applicable; v whether there should
be a land diversion program, and if
so, the extent of such diversion and
the level of payment; whether
barley sould be determined
eligible for payment purposes
under the feed gram program;
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whether malting barley should be
exempt from any acreage
reduction program; if an acreage
reduction, set-aside or payment-in-
Kind program is necessary,
whether to allow haying and
grazing of conservation use
acreage; provisions of the farmer
owned reserve; whether to require
offsetting compliance if an
acreage reduction program is
established; and whether to in
clude popcorn and waxy corn as
field corn for program purposes.
Details of program options
USDA is considering were
scheduled to appear m the June 24
Federal Register.
Comments will be accepted by
Howard C. Williams, director,
analysis division, USDA-ASCS,
room 3741-S, ' P.O. Box 2415,
Washington, D.C. 20013.
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