Fodder Beet
Over the last three to four years there has been a huge amount of interest in growing fodder beet as a winter green feed crop. This renewed interest is because fodder beet can potentially grow a large amount of very high quality winter feed from a small area and once established (after 8-10 weeks) fodder beet requires little care notably it's excellent resistance to the insect pests that attack our brassica crops.
Typical yields from irrigated crops this season have been in the 24 to 28 tonne DM/Hectare range, the highest I know of to date is a massive 35.7 tonne DM/Hectare with dry land crops yielding in the 14 to 18 tonne DM/Hectare, given the dry autumn we have had these yields are excellent.
One of the keys to success in growing fodder beet is in
paddock selection. Typically the best success comes from paddocks coming out of grass that are free draining with a soil pH of 6. We would advise our clients that are thinking of growing fodder beet to start paddock selection now and get a soil test done and identify any issue that may need addressing early.
Cultivar Selection is also a decision that is very important. Since the increased interest in growing fodder beet there has also been an increase in cultivars available in the market. Most of which have no history or trial work under New Zealand conditions.
Fodder beet is an expensive crop to grow but the difference in the seed price per hectare between using unproven and proven seed cultivars is very low we would recommend that you
contact us for the best advice on what cultivar will work best for you. Also only enough fodder beet seed is imported to cover that season's requirements it's therefore important for growers to talk to us early to ensure supply.
Website Link: Click here to go to our
Fodder Beet website page.
Website Link: Click here to download our
Fodder Beet Growing & Grazing Guide.
Website Link: Please
click here to contact us today about our Fodder Beet.
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Kale Seed Supply Information
Supplying our clients preferred kale seed last spring was very difficult following a New Zealand wide poor kale seed harvest. However I'm happy to say this is not going to be an issue for this coming spring season. This season we had a good Kale (and all other brassica) harvest with excellent seed quality and seed is at the cleaning plants being processed as I write this newsletter.
Website Link: Please
click here to go to our
Kale section of our Brassica Seed website page.
Website Link: Click here to download our
Brassica Growing Guide.
Website Link: Please
click here to contact Specialty Seeds today about our Kale.
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Deja Vu !
I recently read an article from an Australian farming magazine reporting the big increase in the export of live dairy heifers to mainly China and Russia.
This year it is expected that 60,000 dairy heifers will be live exported an increase on last year's 51,000. Australian exporters claim they alone will not be able to fill the demand and these countries will try to source stock from other sources, preferably New Zealand. Another comment that interested me was "Australian dairy farmers can be confident any surplus Holstein Friesian heifers for the foreseeable future will have a ready export market".
Does make one wonder about some of the issues this could have for our extremely important dairy industry in the coming years?
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