How to organically refit a hay field?

jeudi 8 juin 2017

Let me first start off by saying I'm not getting into the organic hay business.

Having said that, I do have access to a couple fields within a mile of my farm that haven't been hayed for close to 20 years. I've been taking the hay off of one of these fields for the last few years, but it's not the best quality and I would like to refit all the fields and bring them back into production over the next few years. The problem is that the land owner's lady gets really bent out of shape at event the hint of the word "Roundup". (It's exactly what the fields need, 2 years or so of corn/roundup and then reseed for hay.) I should also point out that while the fields haven't been used for a while, they have been mowed with a Bus Hog at least once a year, so there isn't any tall brush or other stuff to contend with. I think the worst weeds to deal with are goldenrod, some wild rose, etc.

So my dad and I were talking about how to deal with this and he is wondering if we refit the fields and put in orchard grass or an early maturing variety of timothy (along with fertilizer and lime as needed), will the more aggressive cutting schedule allow us to pressure the weeds out and end up with a good stand of hay? He was thinking of plowing it under now, then letting it set all summer and reseed in the fall. Over the course of the summer, we would hit it with the disc or cultimulcher every so often to keep any new weeds from getting established. We could also use this time to incorporate lime into the soil to help get the pH back where it needs to be.

Another option that I was wondering about is if there are any organic herbicides that would give a good kill of the stuff already growing in the field and allow us to reseed this fall? I would still need to find out if the lady in question is against all herbicides or just Roundup in particular, but I can work on that.