New Farmer: Sowing BMR Sudangrass for Soil Prep

Hi everyone,

I've been reading many tractor talk discussions on this portal and have learned a lot. I'm a new farmer and I want to amend and improve my soil structure and want to use BMR Sudan grass. I'm preparing to plant an orchard. I'm in Colorado, I have valmont/dunn soils with sandy, gravelly-clay loam. Former horse property. Since, I have small acreage without a large tractor, I was able to hire someone to disc the strip rows...leaving the native grass for tractor rows. However, I find the discing was more like breaking up sod and a little soil. I thought I would see more overturned soil. I'm not sure if I got what I paid for. I would love some advice.

I now have a Kubota B-Series tractor now I bought to use for "smaller jobs"
My strategy for the bmr sudangrass is sod busting and soil structure improvement with some green manure.
-sow in early summer
-late summer - at 3-4' chop back and let return
-early fall till under
-sow a different winter cover
-plant trees in Spring.[/list]

There's more than one type of disc, from light finishing discs to heavy tillage discs. Even a heavy disc can only do so much to established sod.

What do you plan on tilling the sudangrass under with in the fall?

Does this sudangrass grow well in your area? Really you can use anything that's annual and grows well in your area for a "cover crop" and/or "green manure."

The first rule to improving soil structure is to stop tilling it. iIf you have sod, leave the tillage equipment home, use some roundup to
kill the sod, and have someone no-till into the dead sod.

If it is sod now, what makes you think your soil structure needs improving? A prairie is how ma nature/god intended you soil to be if it was
native prairie.

Sort of apples to oranges opinions but my uncle and
late father farmed together organically for 25 years or
more. I do not know nearly as much as they do but I
picked up a little along the way. I doubt if either one of
them would tell you that spraying Roundup on you soil
and killing the worms and microorganisms would be
the best step towards improving soil structure and
fertility.

I like your enthusiasm and plan sounds good. I would stop aiming for bare soil now and no-till seed your sudangrass. AND add a few more species in the seed mix. Some
legumes like clover or vetch, some more grass like rye and maybe some radish or turnip. Go nuts. You can't have too much diversity in a cover crop.

When I worked for Rutgers, we did one like this in what had been cow pasture for decades upon decades. Leave the sod row middles alone except for mowing. We
killed the sod in the rows with herbicide. You've already disked them, so seed in sudan grass, tillage radish, and any other annual with a deep tap root or
fibrous root system. Shred residue and leave it rot where it is. Do not till it in. Plant the trees through it. I realize that may be the issue though,
depending on how you're going to set the trees.
Green Cover Seed

Depending on what you have for water available you might want to rethink the sudan grass thing. It is like corn and requires a lot of water to grow well. Lots of nitrogen and wil not plow down well if you let it get to 3-4 ft tall then cut back to 6inches or foot tall to regrow. The radishes or clover even rye would work better for what you are looking to do I think. Radishes will put down a root over a foot in a year and clover would be a good companion to fruit trees since you could plant your trees right into the clover and radishes letting the cover crop die out as the trees take over and it will take decades to build up soil for any crop that way. Trees will put roots down through stone or asphalt if they want. having your soil tested and fertilizer added before planting would do more for them.

I have far more worms, soil bacteria, fungi etc with roundup than we ever did with the plow, organic or not. It's contrary to popular thought, but the truth. Many of the organic fields I've worked with (and I'm related to some of them) are about the deadest soil anywhere.

I'm sure my view will upset many, but tillage is the biggest soil degrader there is.

If you know this ignore it. Apple and many other fruit trees have moderately deep roots. If the tree is grafted root stock, especially if a
dwarf or small format tree type) the graft must be above the ground to prevent root development above the graft. Rooting above the graft can
change the growth pattern to normal tree height. The top 8 inches of soil will make little difference to the tree. if bare root trees are
purchased, (about 3/4 inch trunk) the planting hole should be about 2 to 2.5 feet deep, and 15 to 18 inches in diameter. Loam soil and
composted manure at 50/50 should be used in the bottom of the hole about 2 inches deep. Next a layer of the top soil removed from the hole at
the start of the dig, mixed with 30% compost. Use this mix to set the root stock as above, centered and tamped into root contact and watered
as the hole is filled. the last soil can be the sub soil (unless it is clay) to level with the grade. more water is then applied. The soil
will subside as it compacts, so periodic checks should be made to fill to level all depressed holes. watering to retain moist but not saturated
soil is needed until at least a year has passed to avoid stressing the tree as it develops new roots.
I have planted hundreds of apple trees and very few had problems. The orchard where I worked had 4000 trees of apple, plum, peach, pear, and
cherry. Mice and other rodents can chew tender new trunks, so putting guard tubes on them is a good idea. (talk to other orchardists in your
area for advice)
Best of luck and welcome to the fruit tree world. Jim

Thank you for the suggestion to add different covers. I will definitely look like adding it to the mix.

A lot depends on the soil and what is in it.Red clay in my area without enough Calcium in it just gets harder and harder,needs to be broken up, a ripper or chisel plow is usually the tool of choice.Also if your sod is dead as you mentioned it'll really have issues.

This makes me feel better. I've been warned about removing too much grass. I'm planting a high density orchard. The rows will be 10' apart.

I want to dig-in the BMR by August. Penn State recommends, "in mid-August, mow sudangrass using a flail mower or other strategy to chop and macerate the grass as much as possible. Incorporate the residue immediately and follow with a cultipacker. It's best not to mow down more area than can be plowed under within two hours."

I can get a flail mower for my Kubota B-series, but I'm worry about the plowing under - will this tractor manage?

Give Chip Hardy at Brookdale Farms in Hollis, NH a call. (603) 465-2240. Chip is one of the country's pioneers in high density orchards, and he loves to chat and tell people what he is doing there. His son Trevor is in charge of day to day operations, but he doesn't have so much time to talk. I dropped by last summer and Chip gave me an hour plus tour of his operation.

(quoted from post at 12:43:17 06/07/22) I have far more worms, soil bacteria, fungi etc with roundup than we ever did with the plow, organic or not. It's contrary to popular thought, but the truth. Many of the organic fields I've worked with (and I'm related to some of them) are about the deadest soil anywhere.

I'm sure my view will upset many, but tillage is the biggest soil degrader there is.

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Coonie I agree with you 100 percent.