July 27, 2007

To get more grazing and a longer season, now's the time to plant turnips into wheat or oat stubble.

Turnips provide good grazing beginning in October and often lasting into the new year. Another benefit is that turnips are cheap to plant with seed often costing less than $5 per acre.

Seedbed preparation and planting can be done several ways. Some turnip growers work soil like a fully prepared alfalfa seedbed. Others heavily disk their ground, but leave it fairly rough before broadcasting seed. A few growers spray Roundup® or Gramoxone® on wheat or oat stubble to kill weeds and then plant no-till.

Whatever method you choose, good early weed control is essential. Turnips do poorly if weeds get ahead of them, but once started, turnips compete very well. Since no herbicides are labeled for turnips, weeds must be controlled either by tillage or by using contact herbicides like Roundup or Gramoxone before planting. Then plant quickly to get the turnips off and running.

Plant only 2 to 3 pounds of turnip seed per acre. The seed is very small, so barely cover it. Simply broadcasting seed onto tilled soils works well for many growers, especially on rough seedbeds where rainfall or irrigation washes soil onto the seeds for soil coverage. If you drill seed, just scratch the surface with the openers.

With a few timely rains you could have excellent green feed for late October, November and December.

Bruce Anderson
Extension Forage Specialist