# Is there a place for burning in hay-field renovation?



## DaveW (Sep 12, 2015)

Here in dry but irrigated southern Idaho, we're trying to improve two and a half acres of timothy and weeds. Have planted a mix, of which the meadow brome took, and planted half to orchard grass which came on nicely after the seed passed a winter. Trying to kill off cheat grass, foxtail, and Medusa head. Finally sprayed the whole place with 2-4D for the broadleaves, but these noxious grasses are more of a problem. We'll make hay for the 1st time in a week or so.

My question--in places there is much thatch and when I burn cheatgrass patches, fire easily spreads under the timothy to burn the dry thatch. If I let this occur, will it kill the timothy? More generally, I know that in natural grasslands, fire is often a good thing. I am tempted to burn the whole pasture this fall...does anyone do this when trying to improve a hayfield?

Thanks for any thoughts.


----------



## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

On occasion I burn off a field....fire is a great tool.

Regards, Mike


----------



## broadriverhay (Jun 13, 2014)

I try to burn my Bermuda every year. But I'm in SC , I'm sure it may be totally different in your neck of the woods.


----------



## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

I've burnt off areas of wild oats and cheat grass, seems to reduce the pressure the next year. Whether or not it will hurt timothy I'm not sure, didn't seem to bother the alfalfa or OG.


----------



## Bishop (Apr 6, 2015)

I have 3 acres of pasture with reed canary grass on floodplain. Every couple years the mat of grass that gets flattened by flooding every fall gets a bit thick and I burn it off very early spring when the grass hasn't started growing yet and it comes strong about 3 weeks after the burn.


----------



## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

This is what I was looking for, all the areas that are burned annually around here tend to become reed canary grass, wild not cultivated type.

Burning grass went out about 20 years ago here except around the native reserves.



Bishop said:


> I have 3 acres of pasture with reed canary grass on floodplain. Every couple years the mat of grass that gets flattened by flooding every fall gets a bit thick and I burn it off very early spring when the grass hasn't started growing yet and it comes strong about 3 weeks after the burn.


----------



## Thumbtack (Jun 18, 2012)

I have tall fescue grass and I burn the field every other year and it comes back thicker. As far as foxtail it will not take care of that. It does clean up the field and grass really takes off. I usually do this in the spring. We irrigate also. Hope this helps


----------



## gosh (Sep 28, 2014)

DaveW said:


> Here in dry but irrigated southern Idaho, we're trying to improve two and a half acres of timothy and weeds. Have planted a mix, of which the meadow brome took, and planted half to orchard grass which came on nicely after the seed passed a winter. Trying to kill off cheat grass, foxtail, and Medusa head. Finally sprayed the whole place with 2-4D for the broadleaves, but these noxious grasses are more of a problem. We'll make hay for the 1st time in a week or so.
> 
> My question--in places there is much thatch and when I burn cheatgrass patches, fire easily spreads under the timothy to burn the dry thatch. If I let this occur, will it kill the timothy? More generally, I know that in natural grasslands, fire is often a good thing. I am tempted to burn the whole pasture this fall...does anyone do this when trying to improve a hayfield?
> 
> Thanks for any thoughts.


Fighting the cheatgrass battle myself. Burned off the dried mats of cheatgrass in the spring. The brome had already come up by the time I got around to doing this and I can't see that the brome grass was hurt any. Sorry, I don't have timothy out there so it's not a direct comparison.

The bad news is that the fire didn't seem to damage the seed on the ground enough to stop it from germinating. Lots of thin green hairs coming up out there....

I don't really want to kill off all the good grass for the 25% that is cheat grass. Might try to roundup it as soon as it starts next year before the brome starts regrowing. Just not sure yet what I'll do.


----------



## Wethay (Jul 17, 2015)

Here in the valley most of the grass is for seed. Years ago the fields were burnt every year after harvest. It was common knowledge that it had to happen to remove the straw, bugs, disease, etc. Then DEQ says no. Straw gets baled and stacked to rot or be burnt (you could get a permit to burn a straw stack, but not a field). Years go buy and the Japanese start buying straw for cattle feed for about the cost of baling, compressing and shipping. Then people start chopping the straw after harvest and find they can save on fertilizer. Now farms can have there straw bid on, so much an acre, more if it has more than this much straw. Sometimes the price for straw is a big bonus to the bottom line.


----------

