I am in the process of raising 3 to 4 beef cows and was wondering how much corn I should plant to last 2 full years? I have a 47 acre field set aside for this..the rest will be for hay. havent decided if im planting 100bu or 200bu/acre or not.. any suggestions? I have all equipment needed.. this corn will be picked with NI 2 row picker and stored in behlen corn crib. My grandfather use to store around 2000bu in this crib but he had closer to 15-20 head of feeders. Dont want to spend more $$ than needed planting corn I dont need but dont want to run out... would it be better to plant enough to last 2 years or just split the field and rotate crop? Live in michigan where pasture grazing is only seasonal... dont have much experience with cattle so im not well knowledged on feeding proportions.. any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.. thanks
I'm no expert, but I posted some feed numbers in the topic "Cob corn vs. shelled corn" a month or two past. That info might help you. You will have to figure out what yield you can get off of your field, and work it out from there. It sounds like you are trying to do what we have done for several generations, just on a smaller scale. I suggest rotating your crop 50-50 each year with hay. Corn will deplete your soil, and hay (specifically, legumes like alfalfa and clover) will replenish nutrients and carbon in the soil. You will sustain the farmability of your field indefinitely with crop rotation, and crop-specific pests will not build up population and pesticide tolerance as much. Likewise, weeds will not build up herbicide resistance as much. Plus, you will have fresh corn and hay each year instead of older feed every other year. We have soybeans in our crop rotation now, but we used to plant oats-alfalfa-corn-corn in a four-year rotation. In those days, we were more self-contained, corn didn't yield as high, and we didn't sell much of our crop off the farm. See if Michigan State has an extension service--they can be a great help.
Thanks for the information. Im thinking that crop rotation sounds about the best option for best soil quality. My only concerns are that I was always told that yield and quality of hay are the lowest in the 1st year of being plowed and re-planted??? And i also was worried about corn residue and the effeciency of the grain drill planting threw it??? I can get a rough estimate of crop yield of my field but I cant figure out about how many bushels I need for each individual adult cow each year???
1. The first year of hay will be the lowest yield, because it takes a bit for alfalfa or clover to get established. That is why we seed oats the first year before hay--it stops erosion and gives alfalfa a seed bed and time to get established. If you get an overhead pic of your field from NRCS or other resource, you should be able to pencil out a multiple year plan that will produce the feed you need. You might have to buy hay for at least the first year until you get established and have a better idea of your ground's production capacity and your needs. You might have to eventually change the ratio of corn to hay acreage after you get established, or even split your ground into three sections for rotation. That way you will have, in any given year, one section corn, one section oats, one section mature hay. You might want to use the oats to ease young calves onto feed. Just an idea--you know your ground the best, so you can analyze it better than anyone else. It sounds like you might have a family farm, so ask older relatives and neighbors if they are still around.
2. If you are worried about corn residue interfering with your drill (particularly if it is not a no-till drill), then disc the stalk ground. One pass with a disc usually takes care of combined corn, while we find that picked corn (which tends to leave the stalks more intact) might take two passes. Older, smaller disks are going for the price of scrap iron right now. First, though, make sure you don't have some government string attached to no-till conditions for your land, which could get you in trouble. This could be a condition attached to a government loan, old CRP arrangement, or other issue.
3. Regarding your question about bushels per cow, you should be able to look at the numbers from the "cob corn vs. shelled corn" topic and convert gallons to bushels (roughly). It isn't an exact science, anyway. Keep in mind that those numbers are for fattening butcher calves. I would cut the corn in half or less for breeding cows--too much fat can cause birthing issues. We rarely ear pick more than 10 acres in any given year, and we feed out 35-40 fat cattle each year. Our yield on those acres is 175-200 bpa. It sounds like you should start with maybe 5 acres or less of ear corn for 3-4 head and adjust as needed in subsequent years.
Boy, if anyone else has any ideas, please chime in. Michigan ground is a lot different than Iowa, so I'm way out on a limb.
