Baldy Safflower for Grazing and Soil Structure
Walk through a Baldy safflower test plot with Keith Berns and Nathan Choat. See how this spineless variety performs in grazing mixes, why its deep taproot helps break compaction, and how to use it as a high-protein stockpile feed in fall and winter.
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0:00 [Music]
0:05 All right now we come to safflower. Now if you're familiar with safflower at all, you're probably thinking man how are those guys standing that close to that.
0:12 Because most safflower is like a thistle. It's got pretty long little thorns and barbs, and it's really difficult to walk through because it'll literally poke through your blue jeans, but this is a
0:23 Very unique type of safflower, it's called baly. It's called baly because it's spineless and you can run your hand through this and there's no barbs or spines on it.
0:33 All this is a unique variety developed by Montana State University and we have the exclusive license to this. So if you want baly safflower you need to come to Green cover to get it. We thought it.
0:45 Was worth doing because safflower is a fairly nutritious plant for livestock. Cattle will eat it readily but not so readily when it's got all those thorns on it so Nathan talk a little bit about.
0:55 What you're seeing in this Baldi safflower out here, yeah so I'm a big fan of Baldi safflower. It's a broad leaf, it has a really nice tap root structure for helping to.
1:06 Build that soil structure and reduce compaction. This safflower plot has done a great job this summer of holding back the weeds. Really where I use a lot of safflower is in grazing mixes.
1:29 Very high in protein, and so in a stockpile situation it plays a nice role. It has good standability, so when you turn the animals out there in the fall and winter time they can come.
1:38 Through here and pick these seed heads off and get a nice high energy high protein feed source late into the season. So safflower is in the same family as sunflowers but safflower is a
1:50 Little more cold tolerant, maybe a little less heat tolerant, but really it's held up pretty well through the summer. But this planted in July or August and then growing into the fall.
2:00 Is going to give you that really nutritional boost in a stockpile mix like what Nathan said. So consider balky safflower if you're looking for a deep tap-rooted broad leaf that you can add to your grazing mixes.