Orchard grass stand loss

In the past I have never had much luck growing orchard grass. Usually what would happen is in the summer of the first year of a fall planted stand clumps would start dying out after first cutting and would end up with a thin stand. By the second summer it would be thin enough that other weedy grasses would take over and the stand wouldn't be worth keeping. I always blamed this on a few week period of drought that is not unusual for us to have sometime during the course of summer here. I was of the opinion the varieties I was using just couldn't stand a stretch of dry weather accompanied by high temps. This is one of the reasons I went away from growing orchard the past few years.

Last fall I decided to try orchard grass again because I had a particular customer that wanted orchard. I decided on planting the variety Paiute as it is supposed to be be one of the most drought tolerant varieties of orchard and is even promoted to being used in dry land conditions in the western states. I ended up with the best stand of orchard I have ever had and got a nice first cutting back in May. We have had plenty of moisture and it grew back really well and I cut second cut two weeks ago.

I went this evening to see how the field was growing back. My heart sank when I walked into the field.....lots of dead clumps over the whole field. It looked just as if these clumps died from lack of water as I thought happened to my orchard in the past but that can't be the case because this year there hasn't been a shortage of moisture. Now I'm starting to wonder if in the past the orchard didn't actually die from drought and there is another cause. I leave a 4" minimum stubble so it's not from cutting too short. Fertility is in good shape with no shortage of potash. Anyone have any ideas what might be causing it to die? This is extremely frustrating. Please help!

Hayden

Orchard grass stand loss