# Alfalfa Planting Advise



## ewalker (Apr 14, 2010)

Need advise, I have approx. 3 acres I will be planting a Alfalfa Orchard Grass mix for Horse hay. I live in central Indiana, what would be a good mixture rate pure acre? Also half of the field was beans last year, planned on discing and broadcasting the seed then pulling drag to cover seed. Is that a good plan? The other half was bean 2 yrs ago and it has a prety good stand of Red Clover coming up so thought I would roll it the first cutting and disc and plant in August. Any advise, on a tight budget I like more grass thatn Alfalfa for feeding my horses just my personal preference.

Thanks

Ed


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## BCFENCE (Jul 26, 2008)

You can go sveral routes, If you wanted to drill some alfalfa in it right now that might work. If you wanted to work the ground first, you could either mix the alfalfa and grass together with your ferdlizer then make at least 3 trips over your field to get a good even stand. Then run a cultipacker over the ground next to pack the seed in the ground, Do not run a drag over it after you sow your alfalfa seed, you might get some of it to deep. You need to soil test first to make sure what you need to put on it such as lime being the most important along with your other ferdlizer.


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## Rodney R (Jun 11, 2008)

I'm not sure how successful planting grass this time of year will be - if it sprouts and then turns dry, it'll die. Ideal time here (SE PA) would be in late august. Work the ground real well, and then broadcast the seed. Run a cultipacker over the ground after planting. Keep the teeth out of the ground - you just want to smoosh the seed into the loose ground, you do not want to disturb the soil at all, as some of the seed may get too deep, like BC said. Normal planting here would be 20 lbs alfalfa and 10 O-grass, so maybe go 5 and 5? I know that some folks have said they get a nice stand of grass by planting just 3 lbs of timothy or o-grass. I think the mixes that I have planted I fell in the 3-5 category. You might cut the alfalfa rate downward evn farther, I don't know how little alfalfa you want, but it'll come in a 50lb bag, so it's kinda a waste to buy 50lbs to only use 10-15lbs. maybe somebody near there will sell you a little?

Rodney


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

I haven't had much success with spring plantings here in west central Illinois. Great success with frost seeding in late Feb., planting in mid August. I have a new field of Alf/OG planted Aug. 20th last year that is so tall, I may have to use a chain saw to cut the alfalfa (I might be exaggerating just a bit.) I planted at 12# alfalfa/8# OG because I wanted a little more OG for horse hay.

My pure alfalfa stand planted April, 2009 gave me one thin cutting in Sept., 2009, and did not sprout well on the north facing slopes. I am thinking of drilling about 8-10# of timothy after my August cutting.

Ralph


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## ewalker (Apr 14, 2010)

Ok, worked the field once last night, pretty dry and hard will work again tonight. We are expecting Rain Friday thru most of next week, should I wait until after the rain before I plant or try and get it in before? I have also arranged the use of a cultipacker, talked to a local supplier and he recommended a grass hay mix (Orchard, rye, Timothy) and add Alfalfa, any thoughts on this? I am like Ralph prefer more grass than Alfalfa but would like some in there. I am not real concerned with getting a good cutting this year just want to get it established for next year, but a late cutting would be good. Like I said the other half will be planted in August the only thing I did to that field was mow last year and there is a pretty nice stand of Red Clover coming up, will round bale it the first cutting and maybe the second then work and plant in August. The clover in volunteer, I did not plant it does have some weeds but it is for cattle hay so not to concerned about it for now.

Thanks for Any and All Advise

Ed


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

Tried a OG/Timothy/Alflafa mix in a pasture a couple of years ago, not a roaring success. Then tried a field with OG/Timothy/red clover (cover crop) mix--came up great, but timothy died off after about 2 years because we were mowing it too short (my bad!).

Timothy just can't seem to take much traffic on the root system, so I plan of drilling some in every 2-3 years to keep it fresh.

Horses seem to prefer timothy over OG; cattle don't seem to care. Timothy as a cash crop just don't carry the price in this area, even for horse people. Prices this year ran in the $1.75/sq bale range. I only plan on 2 cuttings for timothy each year.

Ralph


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## ewalker (Apr 14, 2010)

Well I broadcast a mixture of OG, Timothy, Rye, and Alfalfa (More OG than anything) Thursday and then the rain started I did not get a chance to run the cultapacker. We had a light rain all weekend hope it does ok, the ground was real dry I had to disk several times to get good ground (I was only using a 6' Disk). We are about 3" below normal rain fall for this time of year. I still plan on Round baling the other small field and then working and planting the same mixture on it in August. Any suggestions on fertilizer on the field I just planted?


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