Triticale for Spring Forage: Beat High Hay Prices with This Winter Cereal

0:02 Hey everybody, Keith Burns and Zach Lau here with Green Cover to talk a little bit about trite. Trite is a very unique plant in our opinion and it's one of the absolute best for growing forage for your livestock herd.

0:19 Zach, the cattle market may be down a little bit, but man, it's been hot for a long time and I think it's going to continue to stay pretty high because herd numbers are down. And if you have livestock, the absolute number one biggest expense that you're going to have is feeding them. It's the forage. What are you hearing out there in the marketplace right now of the forage stocks, forage condition? How expensive is that going to be for people?

0:48 Yeah, like you mentioned, the livestock market is hot. So is most of the planes and they have been for the last two months, two and a half months. And with limited rainfall and snowfall last year, a lot of those areas really didn't have a great growing season to make a lot of those stored forages this year that they would in the past, including the inner mountains, which is kind of wild. But yeah, I mean I think it's going to be short. A lot of the hay markets are starting to indicate that it's going to be short. Stuff's slowly ticking up. I was just listening to a report last night that said the cow producers, you know, it's low of a herd number we have right now. The cow producers are looking to basically liquidate those lower quality animals or something that might have skipped a calf and they kept for a year. But now this kind of inversion of forage is making guys think that they need to be doing something else. And I would contend that doing something else could mean planting some tray.

1:55 Yeah. Because unlike hay I have 60 acres of brome or a perennial type grass, you know you only get one opportunity a year, maybe two in some places to harvest that. Well, with treated kaylee, you can replant that here in the next month or so, you know, harvest that next spring and still go to another cash crop next year. So it's a really good opportunity for people who either need the forage or in an area where the

2:23 Forage is very marketable. Let's talk about that. Let's talk about what is triticale? Why is it better than cereal rye? Cereal rye gets all the hype from the cover crop side of things and well there's a lot of reasons why it's well deserved. Can you talk a little bit about the difference between triticale and cereal rye and where each one has the best fit?

2:46 Sure. So let's start at the root of it. Triticale is actually a cross between cereal rye and Durum wheat. And they came up with it as they were looking for a plant that could have the cold hardiness of the cereal rye and the plant structure of the wheat to kind of balance the best of both worlds essentially.

3:06 And since then there are different breeding companies that have gone in and selected it even more for that forage mindset. So the products we are carrying now on the triticale side are either awnleted which means it has a very very short beard, you know half inch max, or a full beardless product and that's a huge difference from cereal rye because cereal rye as we all know will make great big beards and it does it pretty early so it really cuts back your grazing or your harvest window.

3:39 Yeah. So cereal rye is great for grazing for a period of time, but yeah, once it heads out, it's almost unpalatable for just about all livestock. And so it could be great grazing early on, but it's not going to be what you're going to have the best stored forage or late grazing on. But the triticale being beardless is better.

4:04 Well, yeah, absolutely. I saw one time that there was a statistic that like over 50% of cereal rye photosynthesis is done through the stem, which if you're a forage person, you know that your stem is not necessarily where your nutrition is for your animals, but that's where a cereal rye is pulling its photosynthesis from. So that's a key indicator is even as that plant elongates, you're not going to have the tonnage potential that you could out of your triticale as well. The leaves are much wider and that is all done through breeding.

4:39 Yeah. Breeding and selection. So the triticale is bringing that cold hardiness, the deep rooted, the height of the cereal rye parent, but bringing in the leafiness, the higher palatability, the higher protein, the leaf retention and the beardless trait from that wheat side.

5:01 Yep. Absolutely. And I think it even is stretching that maturity out just a little bit longer. You know often times it'll be at what 10 days probably from elongating its stem compared to cereal rye too which is another added benefit especially if you're doing a graze and then pulling stuff off to try to get some type of stored forage crop after that.

5:28 Mhm. Yeah. So longer season. So there might still be a really good fit for having rye as part of your grazing program that you're going to graze early and then go to something else after you've grazed it. The triticale is definitely for that later grazing or that later haying or chopping or wet bales or something like that. Talk, Zach, talk a little bit about how you talk to people about, you know, at what growth stage would you be putting triticale up for restored forage? You know, is it better in a hay bale? Is it better in a silage bag, a wet bale? You know, what kind of tonnage potentials are there? Just talk a little bit about some of those things.

6:12 Yeah. So there is a room for all of those with triticale, which is nice because a lot of them don't really qualify for that. So you can have someone whose goal is to put it up as dry hay and be able to do so. It's not easy to do. I mean, we have to take into consideration the time of year we're trying to put it into a dry bale. And that's probably depending on where you're at north and south. It's going to come in May. It normally rains in May hopefully. So it can be done. I would like to see it done, you know, at that boot stage if you're trying to put it into a hay bale so you're not getting that extra stem in it. It's going to make really nice feed at that stage and you're not going to have to worry about the head getting completely dry. Try to

7:00 Get the head as dry as it needs to be to roll into a bail. Most people I would say that are trying to do that if they have the means to it are either putting it in some type of wrapped bail or silage. Silage is very, very, very popular with the tray market and those two are a lot more flexible. I would say where we live it may rain 60 days in the spring and you don't have a choice but to wait. And as long as the guys that we've got doing it down here, as long as they've got moisture to pack it, they're going to chop it. So it really stretches that window out.

7:42 And one of the unique things about Trite is we've got numerous customers that are able to make 20 ton an acre silage off of it, which is a lot. That's a lot of forage coming out of a spring crop.

7:57 Yeah, and you know where we're at here in southern Nebraska it would be you know we could take tray off for a silage crop and we could double crop sorghum sudan for sure as the second forage crop, probably be a little bit tight on us doing silage corn, you know full season silage corn, but as you move south that's a fairly common thing for those guys to do. Yeah, a lot of people in our area will even take it off as silage and plant double crop beans the same time as first crop beans are getting planted if you're going to a commodity crop. But as we go out west, yeah, we have a lot of acres that go into forage sorghum after tray. They can get it off to the races and have plenty of daylight and heat to get all that crop fully mature, too.

8:50 Yeah, so that all sounds great, you know, getting a crop and how late into the fall do you feel like tray can be planted? I mean, cereal rye can be virtually planted every day of the year if you can get the drill in the ground. Is tray kind of the same way or what's kind of ideal and then what's still acceptable?

9:11 Yeah, sure. So there's definitely an ideal time frame for getting these forage crops established because essentially you're setting yourself up for fall growth, dormancy, and then spring growth, rapid spring growth. I just talked to a guy this morning and

9:29 He's like, 'Well, you think we should wait a little bit longer?' And I said, you know, it's 100°, so the answer probably is yes right now. But as soon as we hit into the 80s and we're dropping our nighttime temperatures back down, I said, I'm going to have to drill in the ground. Don't wait to get it in because you think 80 degrees is too hot. If you've got the moisture, the moisture's on the way, don't wait because if it gets too wet and too cold, then you're not going to get the fall growth. And so much of that wintertime grazing and that next season for this honestly the stand and the forage growth in the springtime is going to come a lot out of the fall tillering and expression.

10:10 So I would tell you, you know, where we live, if you could have it done by November, that's probably going to be near optimum. Into November is still going to be fine. It's going to stretch out your window in the spring and not give you as much fall growth. And I would tell guys, you know, honestly, Thanksgiving, if you can get it seeded up until Thanksgiving, you're not going to have a detriment to your next crop by doing that.

10:42 Yeah. And that's for southeast Kansas. You know, where we're at in South Central Nebraska, you'd probably shift that by at least two weeks, maybe three as you go north. And it kind of depends on your goals, too, Zach. You know, I wouldn't be afraid to plant triticale November 1st here in Nebraska. I just know I wouldn't get any fall grazing out of it, but I'd still have a really good spring crop. But if I'm planting that the end of August here in Nebraska, I know I can get a pretty good grazing in the fall and through the winter and still have a spring crop. So it's got some flexibility there and you know, just know that the later you plant it, you aren't going to really be able to have that fall or winter grazing, but you still have that really good spring growth potential.

11:29 Yeah, absolutely. And would you agree too that the later you plant it, you probably need to be increasing your

11:36 Seeding rate because you're not going to see the tillering?

11:39 Absolutely. Yeah. So the law of diminishing returns is in effect right now when we're early enough in the season to get nice tailoring out of it. So we'll have people that want to plant 120 pounds an acre because they really think they're doing something. And you know, my seating rate right now, from what I've seen, I think 90 pound to 100 pound threshold is where you peak it right now, but then as you get into that middle, late October, early November, if you're still trying to maximize that forage crop the next year, that's probably a situation where you are thinking 100, maybe 110 pounds an acre just to get the amount of seeds per acre out there. The stems per acre really is what you're after at that point.

12:26 So, is there anything that you can put with the trinity to enhance the quality of it? You know, we, you know, here at Green Cover, we're all about diversity. And certainly, you know, the more specific your goals are for this, you don't necessarily have as many things to choose from, especially in the fall, but you know, what do you see people putting with Trinay if they want to add something?

12:50 Yeah. So, I've had several people, let's just call them south of I7, that's a decent threshold that are using trite with Harry Vader Crimson Clover in a ration that they know that's going to go into a wet bail or a silage pile. They really, really, really like it. Those two seem to keep up with it and are able to perform early enough. The Crimson is early enough to express itself and the Hary Veg is just tough enough to express itself. And so those go nicely together. You know, if someone is grazing it in the fall, I always think it's a great time to plant brasas if you can get them in early enough, especially with your tray, it's not going to cost very much. It's going to increase the sugar out there as those brasas are growing and and kind of help get them cattle flushed up for the winter. And you know, it's all about your goals, though. Some people put winter peas in it. I haven't necessarily seen where winter peas make me as

13:54 Excited as some of those others because they just can't get going in the springtime like the trite would need to be.

14:06 We carry green cover carries two different types of trite and each is kind of suited a little bit better to a certain region. Why don't you talk about, you know, we have the 813 and we have the 4FX 100002. Talk a little bit about the origins of each of those, the specific goals that the breeders were after with those two and how we kind of like to position those two specific varieties.

14:30 So we'll talk about A13 first. A13 is our unleted variety and it has been kind of our staple for the last, I always want to say a few years, but then I think I've been here six years.

14:55 So it's been our staple for quite a while and it has a really nice fit. You know, where Bladen is south, Bladen is kind of pushing it on the north end of it for having consistent over winterness, but through the plains of Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, that wheat country, wheat belt, I guess, would be a good description for it. That's kind of where that product was made for and kind of found its roots. And it's a good product there. It's kind of a little bit earlier variety than some of them, but when people start to talk about early versus late, there's not a lot of days difference.

15:34 That's where it kind of cut its teeth and it's a good product for us. But what we're really excited about is these forage FX 10001 or 10002. We have some of both there. That came out of Montana. And what makes those so exciting is they're beardless varieties. They have very, very, very good winter hardiness. They're not as facultitative, so they don't necessarily grow as much in the fall as A13 would, but they're going to produce a lot of tonnage in the springtime, especially under like controlled watering environments where you can kind of keep.

18:27 There, you know, it just it's going to vary widely. But what I would tell you as a good steward of your resources, specifically your nitrogen, you know, make an effort to get those split applied. There's no reason to give it all at once. You don't want it to lead your wash off. So just go ahead and take the time. It's going to be a better product. And it's going to stretch out that forage value actually even higher to balance those nutrients out.

18:57 And then as far as like just management in season goes, another reason not to do it all up front is you don't want it to necessarily get super duper leggy, which means we don't want it, they all can have the possibility to lodge. Everything can launch if it's big enough up front. So just kind of keep that in the back of your mind as you're putting your nitrogen on. And then other management, you know, we really don't see a lot of disease pressure in a lot of this trickles. Like they're the breeders have done some pretty good selections.

19:31 You may have a touch of rust from time to time if you have severe infestations somewhere, but overall they're it's pretty disease tolerant. Most of what I have seen is the diseases that you get are going to come on late and that might be an issue if you're trying to grow it for grain, which most people are not. There are grain varieties of trite that do very well. We're not we don't really carry those. We're we're forage guys. We're selling the stuff that people are going to grow through forage. And if you're haying it, chopping it on, you know, kind of an appropriate time frame, I don't really think those diseases are going to be a real big deal for you there.

20:16 Absolutely. So, people ask, well, how do I know if I can grow tray? Maybe I've got muck or maybe I've got sand. I would I tell people this all the time. True is almost as widely spread as serial R is. From Canada to Mexico, from coast to coast, in between mountains, everywhere. It can take it. I mean, it and it takes it pretty well, too. The higher rainfall environments, you may have a little bit more management involved in that because you can potentially get

20:48 Something a little bit big, but it's pretty easy to grow. Like you just kind of plant it and let it do its thing. It's a little bit bigger seed size than cereal rye is. I think some of ours has been, you know, 12 13,000 seeds per pound instead of, you know, 16 to 18,000 on cereal rye. So just be cognizant of that as we're making our seeding rates.

21:12 And then, you know, the big conversation right now is triticale is the most expensive cereal that we're carrying this year. And it may present itself as a little bit of a sticker shock compared to just regular hairy cereal rye, which is our normal cereal rye. But if we figure, you know, rough figures, we're planting 100 pounds an acre, its seed cost is going to cost $42 an acre. Well, that may sound like a lot right now, but if you look at the hay market and look at cost per ton on a hay bale, and yeah, you've got inputs, fertilizer, you've got to put the stuff in a bale and all that. It doesn't take, it doesn't take very many hay bales or tons per acre to pay off $42 an acre in seed cost.

22:03 And really, it's not $42 more an acre. That's the gross cost. So even if you plant cereal rye, it may be, let's just say worst case scenario is it's 40% more seed cost than cereal rye, you're going to get way more than that out of it.

22:19 Yeah. So the moral of the story is, if you want grazing in March and April, don't plant triticale. Plant cereal rye. It's cheaper. It's going to give you really good growth those months. But if you need it the last half of April and taking you into May or you want that stored forage and want as much of that as you can, triticale is going to be a much better fit. And you know, one of the reasons that triticale has and it's always been more expensive than cereal rye. Part of it is there's a lot of genetic selection, a lot of breeding that has gone into it. Whereas a lot of the cereal rye is, you know, it's cereal rye. It's open pollinated. It's just it is what it is. There's not a lot of protection put into it. There's not a lot of research put into it. It's a great cover crop, but it's never going to be on that high.

23:14 So can you talk a little bit about how because of that breeding these things have protection on it and you can't just grow out, you can't just go out and grow the seed yourself?

23:27 Yeah. So all of our trinitles are PVP, planetary protection. Which basically means those breeders have essentially a patent on the genetics, which means whoever grows it from a certified seed source has to pay a royalty back to those breeders. And essentially what that does is pay them for their time invested upfront, trying to recoup as much cost as possible. One of the benefits or the pros to that is every time you buy it from somebody that sells it as a certified product, you know you're getting what you're paying for. You know that it's coming from that breeding line and you can guarantee some level of consistency in that. And it also means that you can't just have everybody growing it, harvesting it, selling it to your neighbors. It's not legal. It's a law. And so that does carry a cost. It carries certification cost from the states. It carries that royalty back to the breeder and it carries more paperwork on all sides of it.

24:42 Yeah. But you're getting a better product because it has been field inspected. It's got multiple levels of inspections on the seed even after it's harvested. And there's all that breeding work that went into it. And when we're paying those royalties, it is backpaying the people that developed it, but it's also allowing them to invest in breeding the next generation. And these companies are coming out with new lines all the time, better disease, better productivity. So you're essentially supporting the next development line of products out there, too.

25:24 Well, anything else, Zach, that you think people should know about Trinidal?

25:29 I think the last thing is the supply context. You know, our serial grain market this year has been highly variable would be a good way to describe.

25:40 From the plains in Texas through Oklahoma, western Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska. We saw everything from drought to hail to flood to fusarium. If it could have happened in a year, it did on triticale and that put the supply in a little bit of a pinch. You know, we're not trying to make anybody fear or anything like that, but I would say if you're planning on having this in your rotation, you should be considering it. I mean, we're into September at this point, almost halfway through September at this point. You need to probably be making plans and starting to think about getting some seed found and purchased.

26:26 I always tell people in the fall, if it's too dry right now, but this is something that you have until Thanksgiving to get done, get that seed on your farm, because when it does rain, you don't want to wait for it. And there may not be any seed left by Thanksgiving.

26:42 Exactly. Yeah. It would not surprise me if most of it, if not all of it, was consumed in the market by Thanksgiving. The quality stuff. You may be able to find some off-spec or some open or some open varieties, but you will see a productivity increase with these better genetics.

27:00 Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's great information, Zach. And again, for anybody who either has cattle or has a market to sell forages to people with cattle, it's a pretty good option and it's something that you could still slip into your rotation without adversely affecting other parts of the rotation. So it's definitely something to consider. So, folks, if you have any questions about triticale or any other cover crops as well, any of the team here at Green Cover, we would love to visit with you to share more of this information with you and hopefully help you get the seed that you need for this fall. So, thanks for listening to us talk about triticale.

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