Why consider a forage blend for Dual Purpose Hay or Pasture needs?

We have been carrying Northstar Seed forage products for a few years now and every year we learn more about forages and how to best use them. 

Sometimes we will get questions about whether a customer should seed a forage blend or just one

type of forage seed for dual purpose Hay and Pasture blends.  We tell folks that that there are a number of benefits of going with forage blends and here are a few:

• when you seed a mixture, you will have more even forage production because different species of grasses mature at slightly different rates.
• these different maturity dates can also help you extend your grazing season.
• a diverse mixture may work best across fields that have variation in terms of soil, salinity etc.  Certain grasses may produce better under certain conditions.
• a diverse mixture of grass will provide a broader range of nutrients for grazing animals to have a more balanced diet.
• research suggests a mixed stand is more resistant to insects and disease.

We have a few different dual purpose hay and pasture blends. 

These blends differ in terms of whether they work well in dry or high moisture (irrigation) conditions.  Another consideration is whether or not alfalfa is included in the blend. Alfalfa can help improve rate of gain for cattle and improve palatability.  However, alfalfa grazing must be managed to ensure that animals do not bloat, so our most popular dual purpose hay and pasture blends have very limited levels of alfalfa in them for this reason.  

Here is some info on some of our more popular dual purpose hay and pasture blends:

DRYLAND CHOICES:
With Alfalfa:

• Prairie Max – Dryland pasture production. Meadow Bromegrass offers a long grazing season with very good quality and regrowth. Crested Wheatgrass, excellent early season growth.
  • 75% Fleet Meadow Bromegrass
  • 20% Kirk Crested Wheatgrass
  • 5% Runner Alfalfa

Without alfalfa

• Saline Pasture Max – High quality all grass blend, no concerns with bloat. Widely adapted blend to various soil types and moisture conditions.
  • 30% Barolex Tall Fescue
  • 30% Carlton Smooth Bromegrass
  • 20% Slender Wheatgrass
  • 20% Dahurian Wildrye

IRRIGATION CHOICES:
with alfalfa

• Dual Max – High quality grass blend with small amount of alfalfa. Offers excellent grazing potential.  Prefers medium to heavy soils
  • 75% Fleet Meadow Bromegrass
  • 20% High Arctic Brand Orchardgrass
  • 5%  Alfalfa Blend 10-5

without alfalfa

• Western Grass Max – High quality all grass blend. If properly managed can be a very productive pasture blend. No concerns with bloat. Note - this is also our recommended horse hay blend. 
  • 35% Fleet Meadow Bromegrass
  • 25% High Arctic Brand Orchardgrass
  • 15% Barolex Tall Fescue
  • 15% Rough Stock Brand Kentucky Bluegrass
  • 10% Express Timothy

Contact us for more information on pricing and availability of these blends for spring 2017.

New softwheat looking good on dryland! -AAC Chiffon Softwheat

We are excited to be releasing AAC Chiffon Softwheat this spring.  AAC Chiffon is a new variety from SeedNet Inc developed by breeder Harpinder Randhawa from AAFC.

LARGER VERSION

Evaluated for 4 years in the Western Soft White Spring Wheat Registration Trials (2008-2011), AAC Chiffon yielded more grain than the other check varieties including AC Sadash and AC Andrew.  These results were most dramatic in the dryland trials where AAC Chiffon really stood out.


AAC Chiffon has a high kernel weight and is taller than AC Andrew or AC Sadash.  We feel it is has a good potential to be a leading soft wheat variety not just for the flour markets but also for ethanol and silage purposes. 

At present, we are cautious in recommending Chiffon on irrigation because it is taller than Andrew and Sadash and is rated Good for lodging versus Very Good for the other two varieties.  We think, though, that it will be a real winner in the dryland softwheat growing areas.

For more information on AAC Chiffon - see our website

Pea leaf Weevil forecast looks threatening for southern Alberta

There is the potential for a damaging pea life weevil infestation in southern Alberta this spring according to the latest forecast released by Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development.

The forecast is based on a survey of damaged crops in late May and early June 2014 (and can be found online at:  http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/prm15134)

Apparently the pea leaf weevil damage in 2014 was quite a bit higher than in 2013 and the government is warning producers south of Highway 1 along with the counties of Kneehill, Wheatland, Newell and Cypress that pea leaf weevil populations are expected to reach damaging levels in 2015.

If we have a warm spring e.g. >20 degrees C for more than a few days in late April or early May the damage will be increased as the warm weather encourages the weevils to arrive early.

Pea leaf weevils will feed on many crops but the larvae will do the most damage to peas and fababeans which act as reproductive hosts.  Apparently they can also do serious damage to seedling alfalfa and less severe damage to lentils and dry beans.

With pea prices the way they are, I am expecting there will be quite a few acres of peas going into southern Alberta in 2015, so farmers will need to be on watch for pea leaf weevil.

How to avoid having problems?  Suggestions from Alberta Ag are to treat your seed, plant early, seed with good levels of innoculant to encourage high yield, and use foliar insecticides if levels reach economic thresholds and if the peas are at the correct stage for spraying - check the blue book for this info.

On our front, we will be advising customers to treat their peas with a seed treatment that can control pea leaf weevils.  Research (see this Top Crop Manager article for more info) suggests that seed treatments are more effective at controlling pea leaf weevils than foliar sprays which can produce inconsistent results.

My take on the barley yield figures in the Yield 2015 Alberta publication.

I've already shared my quick notes on the wheat data in the Yield 2015 Alberta Magazine published by AFSC & Alberta Farmer.  Now let's talk barley!

The Yield 2015 Alberta publication lists the crop insurance acres & yields by variety and risk area in the province.  You can see multiple years of data but for now I am focusing on 2014, which, as we know was a bit of a tough year on barley with snow and bad conditions at harvest. Keeping in mind that these conditions had an impact on the results, I will take you through the highlights....


BARLEY ON IRRIGATION RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
The barley results mix malt barley and feed, 2 row and 6 row results.  So I am going to look at all barley together for the sake of simplicity.

There seems to be less demand for 6 row barley these days but when you see the yield results on irrigation, it makes you wonder why.  Top yields for barley on irrigation are:

• Muskwa 6 row Feed (SeedNet) - avg 106 bu was tops on irrigation
• CDC Yorkton 6 row malt (Canterra) - avg 104 bu
• CDC Coalition 2 row feed (Canterra) - avg 97 bu
• AC Harper 6 row malt (Secan) - avg 96 bu
• Vivar 6 row feed (Secan) - avg 96 bu
• CDC Thompson 2 row feed(FP Genetics) - avg 94 bu
• CDC Austenson 2 row feed (Secan) & Xena 2 row feed (CPS) - avg 88 bu

Other varieties were below these yields.

BARLEY ON DRYLAND RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
There is a long list of varieties in the dryland barley table.  I was surprised to see how well the malt barleys do for yield in general on dryland.  Many folks don't consider growing malt barley varieties that are a little less popular than Metcalfe and Copeland but many of these other varieties yield very well for feed and can go for malt depending on demand. 

The top varieties, in 2014, province-wide for barley on dryland were:

Tops:

• AC Major (CPS) 2 row malt barley - avg 79 bu
• Merit 57 (Canterra) 2 row malt barley - avg 75 bu
• AAC Synergy 2 row malt (Syngenta), CDC Coalition 2 row feed (Canterra), and CDC Polar Star 2 row malt (Canterra) - avg 73 bu

Close seconds:

• Vivar, Formosa, Stander, and CDC Kindersley were in that 70 - 72 bu range
• CDC Maverick, Lacey, Trochu, Thompson, Sundre, Ponoka, Newdale, Champion, Austenson, CDC Meredith, and Xena were in the 64-69 bu range.

 
OTHER RISK AREAS:
I would encourage you to get a copy of this publication and look at the results in your risk area of the province.  I would also recommend that you look at not just the results for 2014 but also the results for prior years because, as every farmer knows, every year has it's unique set of challenges.

THE FINAL WORD:
In these last few blogs my focus has been on yield results.  Obviously, yield is important but many farmers will sacrifice a bit of yield if they can get better standability or quality.  In addition, markets are very important and our two best selling varieties this year are AC Metcalfe and CDC Copeland because these two varieties are in demand with malt companies.  So yield is important but really it all boils down to what is going to work best on your farm.

Interesting wheat variety info from Yield 2015 Alberta magazine

Well on the surface, it may not seem like an exciting read, but when you look really close, there is some interesting data to be found in Yield 2015 Alberta Magazine published by AFSC & Alberta Farmer.

The publication lists the crop insurance acres & yields by variety and risk area in the province and it's interesting to sift through the results.

Here's what I learned about HRSW results in 2014 from this publication.  Of course, everyone knows that 2014 was a bit of a tough year for some parts of the province at harvest so that weather will have impacted the results.  So with that disclaimer, here we go...

HRSW DRYLAND WHEAT RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
The wheat chart is a bit tough to read because it mixes all types of wheat together (HRS, SWS, HRW, CPS, DW etc.).  However, looking just at the HRSW varieties, in 2014, province-wide the highest yielding HRSW dryland varieties were:

Tops:

• Muchmore HRSW (FP Genetics) was a standout- avg 60 bu
• AAC Bailey HRSW (Canterra) - new variety - avg 54 bu
• CDC Plentiful HRSW (FP Genetics) - also new - avg 53 bu
• Harvest HRSW - avg 53 bu

Close Seconds:

• CDC Stanley, CDC Abound, CDC Utmost, CDC Imagine were in the 51 - 52 bu range.
• Stettler, CDC Go, Carberry, CDC Thrive, Cardale, CDC Osler, & Journey were in that 48-49 bu range.

Other varieties had a range of lower yields.

I should briefly mention that the varietal blends (midge resistant variety mixes) did very well with Goodeve VB from Alliance topping the list with a 54 bu average. Snowbird which is a HWW from Secan was also high in the list at 58 bu average yield in 2014.

HRSW IRRIGATION WHEAT RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
In 2014, province wide the highest yielding HRSW irrigation varieties were:

• Cardale HRS (Seed Depot distributed through SeedNet) - avg 85 bu
• CDC Go (public variety) - avg 82 bu
• Carberry (Secan) - avg 78 bu
• Superb (Secan) - avg 77 bu
• Muchmore (FP Genetics) - avg 74 bu
• CDC Abound - avg 73 bu

Again the VB varieties did well with Shaw (Secan) leading the way with an avg 78 bu.

RISK AREA 3 - TABER:
It is interesting to look in your particular risk area in this publication to see which varieties are being grown and how they have done.  So in the my area of Taber, on dryland in 2014, Taber's top HRSW varieties were AC Carberry (Secan) - avg 49 bu and Glenn (Canterra) - avg 48 bu with CDC Go coming in at 46 bu.

I should also note that if a variety wasn't grown by at least 5 producers, they exclude it from the list which might explain why I didn't see Muchmore, Bailey, Plentiful, or Harvest listed in our area.

On irrigation in 2014, Taber's top HRSW varieties were CDC Go - avg 93 bu, Cardale (Seed Depot/SeedNet) - avg 88 bu, Carberry & Superb (Secan) - avg 82 bu.  I would argue that Muchmore should have been up there (full disclosure - we sell Muchmore and I am a fan) but it is listed at 77 bu on a very small amount of acres.


OTHER GENERAL WHEAT COMMENTS:
Of course, I like to look at the varieties that we grow and sell and make a few mental notes when I see something noteable.  I will say that Strongfield Durum (Secan) on irrigation is listed with an average yield of 82 bu province wide. That impressed me because it yielded right up there with the top HRSW varieties. Pasteur GP Wheat (Secan) is listed on irrigation province wide at 94 bu per acre, second only to AC Andrew (Secan) in 2014 at 100 bu.

Dryland silage barley with a smooth awn - check out CDC Maverick Barley

We have been growing CDC Cowboy for a number of years now and it has been a very successful variety for our dryland barley customers.  Tall with a huge amount of plant matter and an ability to do well under low moisture and low fertility conditions, it has become a customer favorite.

So how can you improve on CDC Cowboy? Well Secan has come out with a new sister variety called CDC Maverick.  It yields like cowboy but has a "smooth awn" making it more palatable for swath grazing, bale grazing or silage.  In addition, Maverick is rated as having 10% more forage yield than cowboy.

We have grown Maverick for two years now, starting with a small field and then this year with a bigger field.  We harvested our field for grain and so we can not comment on silage yield but we were extremely impressed with the amount of straw bales that we got off the field.  We think Maverick is going to be worth a try for those folks who have liked Cowboy and are looking for a smooth awn.

We have a limited amount of Maverick available this year so give us a call soon if you are interested in trying some.

New AAC Raymore - the solid choice for Durum

It's always exciting to be offering out a new variety for the first time and this year we have a few new ones.  One of these newly released varieties is AAC Raymore, the first solid stem durum variety in Canada.

2013 crop (our 2014 crop got hailed on before we could get a
 good picture)

AAC Raymore is very similar to AC® Strongfield in yield and most other traits, in fact Strongfield is a parent of Raymore.  It is one day earlier than Strongfield in maturity and a tad bit shorter with the same lodging rating.

The seed guide shows Raymore to have a bit higher protein than Strongfield and we saw this ourselves as our Raymore sample had the highest protein of the durums we grew last year.

The nice thing about Raymore, though, is that it offers an insurance policy,so to speak, against sawfly if you live in an area that has had sawfly issues in the past.

Sawfly is less of an issue in southern Alberta than it used to be, but as a cyclical pest we can expect sawfly to return especially when conditions are dryer.  Tight wheat rotations and dry conditions contribute to sawfly.

One other thing to note for those of you who weren't happy with AC Lillian's solid stem trait which is affected by environmental conditions: Field observations indicate that AAC Raymore is very reliably solid-stemmed.

We did get some hail on our Raymore this year so we don't have as much to offer out as we would like but we do have some AAC Raymore available.  Give us a call to book some seed or for more info.

Also see this video from Jim Downey at Secan on AAC Raymore