August 2015 Making Winter Forage Work for You

The June newsletter covered the spring conditions that made a perfect storm for poor winter forage yields this year.  Yields were down but quality, for those who cut on time, was very good as always (see fermented forage analysis in Addendum to this letter).  Some have been talking about dropping the crop, but there is NO crop I have seen in my 40 years of working and researching that is perfect.  Every crop has a hole in its veneer.

The real advantage of the winter forage is for farms that have had weather related decreases in their total forage supply.  Winter forage (triticale) will give you the earliest high quality, potentially high yielding crop, next spring; forage for the high cows.  This crop is a real advantage in areas where much of the corn is growing in standing water.

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