Soil NPK Indexes

AP2014

Alot of threads on soil fertility, testing, silage, fertilisers going around. In one it is mentioned if index is 1 you need 100 units N 30p and 140k for silage. Surely it would be cheaper to feed concentrates nearly than to put out this amount of chem fert to produce silage.

You are looking at a serious cost per acre on fert alone before contractors, plastic etc is taking into account.

Assuming index 3 is the ideal target would it take much to maintain this if taking a cut of silage? What would the maintenance levels be if just grazing?

More importantly for a lot of farms that have low p and k what is needed to move from index 1 to 3 if no grazing or silage was carried out?

ellewood

Welcome the world of beef farming where a lot oc things ya do cost more than the return from it :-)

Increasing p+ k is expensive tho and unless stocked high enough I dont think it justifies any more than spreading for little more than maintance

rangler1

AP2014 wrote: »

Alot of threads on soil fertility, testing, silage, fertilisers going around. In one it is mentioned if index is 1 you need 100 units N 30p and 140k for silage. Surely it would be cheaper to feed concentrates nearly than to put out this amount of chem fert to produce silage.

You are looking at a serious cost per acre on fert alone before contractors, plastic etc is taking into account.

Assuming index 3 is the ideal target would it take much to maintain this if taking a cut of silage? What would the maintenance levels be if just grazing?

More importantly for a lot of farms that have low p and k what is needed to move from index 1 to 3 if no grazing or silage was carried out?

If you want to make good silage, you need good quality grass, which you won't get at index I.....Yes, it's expensive to build up fertility, but it's not hard to keep fertility high for silage if you're returning the slurry to the same area as you're taking the silage,

AP2014

ellewood wrote: »

Welcome the world of beef farming where a lot oc things ya do cost more than the return from it :-)

Increasing p+ k is expensive tho and unless stocked high enough I dont think it justifies any more than spreading for little more than maintance

Exactly I don't think it can be justified. Wonder can the tillage guys give us the info that is needed to go from index 1 to 3.

onyerbikepat

ellewood wrote: »

Welcome the world of beef farming where a lot oc things ya do cost more than the return from it :-)

Increasing p+ k is expensive tho and unless stocked high enough I dont think it justifies any more than spreading for little more than maintance

I find it very hard to believe that bringing your soil fertility up from index 1 to index 3 is a waste of money. Grass is by far the cheapest feed out there.

Miname

The soil ph is critical before you start trying to bring up the indexes. then bringing up the indexes can be done a multitude of ways, bagged manure isnt the only method. pig slurry mushroom compost even throwing meal to cattle on grass helps.

Miname

AP2014 wrote: »

Exactly I don't think it can be justified. Wonder can the tillage guys give us the info that is needed to go from index 1 to 3.

if you dont think its justified, everyone better quit spreading compound fertilizer. what you have to realize while you may feel its of no benefit to you, there are plenty of others who can justify it. do you really think that the ground will just keep giving without getting anything back?
in your system you'll get by for a while but thats all.

C0N0R

AP2014 wrote: »

Exactly I don't think it can be justified. Wonder can the tillage guys give us the info that is needed to go from index 1 to 3.

If land is the biggest factor in your business ie you can only grow enough grass to support a certain stocking rate, by improving your soil index your able to increase your stocking rate. If you own land at index one, are renting land and aren't actively trying to improve the index of the land own your wasting money in my opinion.

Buford T. Justice XIX

AP2014 wrote: »

Alot of threads on soil fertility, testing, silage, fertilisers going around. In one it is mentioned if index is 1 you need 100 units N 30p and 140k for silage. Surely it would be cheaper to feed concentrates nearly than to put out this amount of chem fert to produce silage.

You are looking at a serious cost per acre on fert alone before contractors, plastic etc is taking into account.

Assuming index 3 is the ideal target would it take much to maintain this if taking a cut of silage? What would the maintenance levels be if just grazing?

More importantly for a lot of farms that have low p and k what is needed to move from index 1 to 3 if no grazing or silage was carried out?

A figure that stuck in my mind from last year is that it costs 100 euro a hectare/year to bring P&K levels up over a number of years from the IGA. I'm not sure if that includes the cost of lime also but i imagine it does.

You can grow grass at a cost of 6c/kg DM but you buy concentrates at a cost of c.30c/kg DM.

On maintainence levels at grazing, it would depend on the level of sales ie milk/cattle/grain you are taking off. Someone here will have Teagasc figures on that, i imagine.

ellewood

onyerbikepat wrote: »

I find it very hard to believe that bringing your soil fertility up from index 1 to index 3 is a waste of money. Grass is by far the cheapest feed out there.

I never said it was a waste of time increasing p+k But ehat I did say thats its un ecomical to do it if ya havent the sr to use the extra grass grown
Like some one else said there are lads paying 200/acre to rent extra ground and if they spent that on their own ground, grew more grass dropped the rented ground thed be better off

AP2014

Miname wrote: »

The soil ph is critical before you start trying to bring up the indexes. then bringing up the indexes can be done a multitude of ways, bagged manure isnt the only method. pig slurry mushroom compost even throwing meal to cattle on grass helps.

I heard meal was getting cheaper alright but jesus surely it's not this cheap :eek:

Greengrass1

We leased grassland last yr.
Best thing we did gave our home farm a break.
Have loads of silage this yr and I'll be able to run a proper grazing system.

It was going to be spent on meal if not.

Were spending a lot if money on p and k here though

farawaygrass

The way I'm looking at it but not saying im right, I could go out and spend my money on all meal, and do the same next year, and the year after and for as long as I'm farming. Or I could spend money on getting soil fertility right, which seems dear in the short term, but when I get it right I'll only have to maintain it. Spending money on lots of meal year in year out is giving your merchant options to grow his business, spending money on soil fertility is giving yourself options to grow your own business.
*no doubt it costs a lot, it does either way.

AP2014

Miname wrote: »

if you dont think its justified, everyone better quit spreading compound fertilizer. what you have to realize while you may feel its of no benefit to you, there are plenty of others who can justify it. do you really think that the ground will just keep giving without getting anything back?
in your system you'll get by for a while but thats all.

farawaygrass wrote: »

The way I'm looking at it but not saying im right, I could go out and spend my money on all meal, and do the same next year, and the year after and for as long as I'm farming. Or I could spend money on getting soil fertility right, which seems dear in the short term, but when I get it right I'll only have to maintain it. Spending money on lots of meal year in year out is giving your merchant options to grow his business, spending money on soil fertility is giving yourself options to grow your own business.
*no doubt it costs a lot, it does either way.

Ignore my system, this question is just based on some posts recently here as I said in my opening post. The general consensus I am getting here is that it is worth doing. The amazing thing is no one seems to be able to cost or determine quantities that are involved in moving from index 1 to 3 in npk. Also to maintain ground at 1 or 3 when taking silage or just grazing.

Greengrass1

AP2014 wrote: »

Ignore my system, this question is just based on some posts recently here as I said in my opening post. The general consensus I am getting here is that it is worth doing. The amazing thing is no one seems to be able to cost or determine quantities that are involved in moving from index 1 to 3 in npk. Also to maintain ground at 1 or 3 when taking silage or just grazing.

To maintain soil index at 3 with stocking rate of 2.7lu/ha you need 16u P and around 30 K
Takes 100 units of P to lift from index 1 to index 3 and then your maintaince figure on top of that

Buford T. Justice XIX

AP2014 wrote: »

Ignore my system, this question is just based on some posts recently here as I said in my opening post. The general consensus I am getting here is that it is worth doing. The amazing thing is no one seems to be able to cost or determine quantities that are involved in moving from index 1 to 3 in npk. Also to maintain ground at 1 or 3 when taking silage or just grazing.

Maintenance and improving the indexes depends on stocking rate and also soil type. There is no easy '5 bags of 10:10:20' answer.

Send a sample in to see the P&K and lime requirements and then adjust for stocking rate and soil type.

AP2014

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Maintenance and improving the indexes depends on stocking rate and also soil type. There is no easy '5 bags of 10:10:20' answer.

Send a sample in to see the P&K and lime requirements and then adjust for stocking rate and soil type.

Thanks, lets say no stock though. Would 90N, 30P and 140K bring me to index level 2. And the same again the following year push me to index 3.

Fully understand there are variables in soil etc, just looking for approx figures here. I realise I am over simplifying.

rangler1

AP2014 wrote: »

Thanks, lets say no stock though. Would 90N, 30P and 140K bring me to index level 2. And the same again the following year push me to index 3.

Fully understand there are variables in soil etc, just looking for approx figures here. I realise I am over simplifying.

Are you referring to fertilising requirement for silage

AP2014

rangler1 wrote: »

Are you referring to fertilising requirement for silage

Initially looking at what is required to go from index 1 to 3 as this is the index for optimum grass growth from what I am told here. Lets say no silage or stock on land.

Then when at index 3, what is required for for one cut of silage or grazing with medium stocking levels and maintain fertility at index 3.

onyerbikepat

See page 8 of the attached.
Don't confuse Units of fertiliser with KG/Ha. A unit refers to one % of a CWT ("hundred weight" - old units), and one CWT is 50.8Kg. So for example a 50Kg bag of 18.6.12 would contain;
9Kg of N,
3Kg of P
and 6 Kg of K.

AP2014

onyerbikepat wrote: »

See page 8 of the attached.
Don't confuse Units of fertiliser with KG/Ha. A unit refers to one % of a CWT ("hundred weight" - old units), and one CWT is 50.8Kg. So for example a 50Kg bag of 18.6.12 would contain;
9Kg of N,
3Kg of P
and 6 Kg of K.

Super stuff, thanks.

Miname

I've brought ground from low index 1 to mid 2 over 3 years using pig slurry on top of fertiliser. I'm going with a coat of mushroom compost this year which is supposed to be good at holding a consistent supply of p. My main issue is all my k's are high index 3s so I'm trying to find a balance without bringing tetany into the equation.

AP2014

Miname wrote: »

I've brought ground from low index 1 to mid 2 over 3 years using pig slurry on top of fertiliser. I'm going with a coat of mushroom compost this year which is supposed to be good at holding a consistent supply of p. My main issue is all my k's are high index 3s so I'm trying to find a balance without bringing tetany into the equation.

Mushroom compost hard to get out? Do you hire a contractor?

onyerbikepat

If your K is high, you could use a fertiliser with a different P/K ratio.
Gouldings for example, make a 15.10.10 fertiliser.

Anyone ever take this approach?

onyerbikepat

15.10.10

Miname

onyerbikepat wrote: »

15.10.10

I'm going with 25-4-0 on some ground. Mushroom compost needs to be spread with either a dung spreader at a minimum of 4 ton per acre to get any kick I'm told

smokey-fitz

onyerbikepat wrote: »

If your K is high, you could use a fertiliser with a different P/K ratio.
Gouldings for example, make a 15.10.10 fertiliser.

Anyone ever take this approach?

Thats what I am at, my p's are index 4 and k's are 1 and 2's so I go with 19.0.15 with intentions of going with murate of potash over the next few years too.

Green farmer

Got my soil test results back. 5.9 ph and p & k both index 1. Any ideas of fertiliser type to use to gradually bring up over a year or two. Was thinking of something like 18.6.12 little and often in addition to lime. Just sheep farm here so no slurry option etc.

Miname

Green farmer wrote: »

Got my soil test results back. 5.9 ph and p & k both index 1. Any ideas of fertiliser type to use to gradually bring up over a year or two. Was thinking of something like 18.6.12 little and often in addition to lime. Just sheep farm here so no slurry option etc.

Lime first then with 18-6-12 you won't go too far wrong

mauser77

If you're ph was 5.3 and you spread lime at 2 ton to the acre how far up the ph scale would you move

onyerbikepat

mauser77 wrote: »

If you're ph was 5.3 and you spread lime at 2 ton to the acre how far up the ph scale would you move

I had fields come back at 5.1 (water PH) and FBA recomended 12.5 Tonnes/Ha. Thats 5 tonne /Acre.
So at a guess you will only get about half way to the 6.3 PH target with 2 tonne/acre.

Miname

mauser77 wrote: »

If you're ph was 5.3 and you spread lime at 2 ton to the acre how far up the ph scale would you move

It all depends on the ground some ground will move a full unit on 1ton others can need 5-6 ton.

onyerbikepat

Miname wrote: »

It all depends on the ground some ground will move a full unit on 1ton others can need 5-6 ton.

Really, would it vary that much? I know it's down to PH buffering capacity of the soil and all that.

Username John

onyerbikepat wrote: »

I had fields come back at 5.1 (water PH) and FBA recomended 12.5 Tonnes/Ha. Thats 5 tonne /Acre.
So at a guess you will only get about half way to the 6.3 PH target with 2 tonne/acre.

Interesting - I had a test done, and it listed

Ph water | Ph Buffer | Tonnes/Ha
5.2 | 5.6 | 13.75

So you had a lower reading, but needed less lime... it got lime about 2-3 ton / acre end of last year, but could do with more this year I guess...

onyerbikepat

Username John wrote: »

Interesting - I had a test done, and it listed

Ph water | Ph Buffer | Tonnes/Ha
5.2 | 5.6 | 13.75

So you had a lower reading, but needed less lime... it got lime about 2-3 ton / acre end of last year, but could do with more this year I guess...

Teagasc recommend that you leave 2 years between each lime application. I might even wait 3 years between mine.
As for the different lime rates between you and me, that's down to the 'buffering capacity' of the different soils, I guess.

Green farmer

Been just thinking about it. I need to lime now and also bring up my p&ks with the associated fertiliser costs. When you add up the cost of fertiliser, being without your best fields for prime months of year and costs of getting contractor to make / wrap silage, I wonder would it be cheaper just to buy in fodder and leave your land for grazing only as opposed to running down fields from silage and grazing ???

mauser77

Green farmer wrote: »

Been just thinking about it. I need to lime now and also bring up my p&ks with the associated fertiliser costs. When you add up the cost of fertiliser, being without your best fields for prime months of year and costs of getting contractor to make / wrap silage, I wonder would it be cheaper just to buy in fodder and leave your land for grazing only as opposed to running down fields from silage and grazing ???

Yes but unless you knew where the stuff was coming from you could just be buying lucky bags and hoping there not bags of muck

onyerbikepat

Green farmer wrote: »

Been just thinking about it. I need to lime now and also bring up my p&ks with the associated fertiliser costs. When you add up the cost of fertiliser, being without your best fields for prime months of year and costs of getting contractor to make / wrap silage, I wonder would it be cheaper just to buy in fodder and leave your land for grazing only as opposed to running down fields from silage and grazing ???

Yes, but these are one off costs. In a normal year only maintenance costs are involved, which are much lower.

farawaygrass

Rome wasn't built in a day either, you can work away at it field by field

Green farmer

I was working out cost of making silage last year. Think it cost me near €15 a bale between cutting, baling, double wrapping, drawing and fert. Buying in stuff would allow a higher stocking rate and more grass available to animal thrive. This depends on your farming setup but I'm sheep,so growing lambs need every blade of fresh grass available. I just thing it's something to be given serious thought , depending on your setup of course.

Username John

Green farmer wrote: »

I was working out cost of making silage last year. Think it cost me near €15 a bale between cutting, baling, double wrapping, drawing and fert. Buying in stuff would allow a higher stocking rate and more grass available to animal thrive. This depends on your farming setup but I'm sheep,so growing lambs need every blade of fresh grass available. I just thing it's something to be given serious thought , depending on your setup of course.

I operate a sheep only system as well (albeit a lot smaller than yerself Green) I wonder is the answer that you take out surplus paddocks for silage, if you have them.
If you don't have any surplus - buy in silage. (Or buy straw and feed more ration as Rangler does)
It does leave you exposed in a bad year maybe, but I imagine if you buy in time you should be ok...

Green farmer

You have a valid point alright john.I suppose the problem is my silage fields are the best quality ones I have and once their out of use the sheep are left on more marginal land, but it's up to every farmer to make up their own mind as no two farms are the same .

Farmer Pudsey

AP2014 wrote: »

Initially looking at what is required to go from index 1 to 3 as this is the index for optimum grass growth from what I am told here. Lets say no silage or stock on land.

Then when at index 3, what is required for for one cut of silage or grazing with medium stocking levels and maintain fertility at index 3.

A cut of silage will take 100 units of K anf 30 units of P off land so that is what you need to replace. This is generall what is needed for a crop that is growing 7-8 weeks in the spring. If you are growing a crop for 12 weeks I imagine that you will need to iuncrease P&K a bit more.

Grazing at a light stocking rate I say a bag of 10-10-20 would be adequate. This is becasue cattle are putting back in most of the P&K you take off. I saw years back a figure for what P&K is taken off land by 100kgs pg LW gain but cannot find it again. It was fairly small.

Growing grass is not rocket science. Even old grass land will increase output if you spray weeds, have the right PH and right index. It amazing how much o/p will improve.

Green farmer

Going buying some granulated lime. Just wondering if it's ok to spread it at the moment ?

Username John

Green farmer wrote: »

Going buying some granulated lime. Just wondering if it's ok to spread it at the moment ?

Why granulated vs ordinary lime? Is it to get it into the soil quicker?

Green farmer

Username John wrote: »

Why granulated vs ordinary lime? Is it to get it into the soil quicker?

Neighbours living on edge of field, and traditional lime will restrict me from making any silage on field this year if I needed to .

Farmer Pudsey

Green farmer wrote: »

Going buying some granulated lime. Just wondering if it's ok to spread it at the moment ?

Yes ok to spread at present. Add advantage it will get rid of tatch at bottom of sward. Try to go with two bags/acre. If PH very low use the grow max 60-70kgs/acre but you need a dry day spreading and moisture on the ground or a shower after.

Reggie.

Green farmer wrote: »

Going buying some granulated lime. Just wondering if it's ok to spread it at the moment ?

How much is a bag of it at the momemt

Farmer Pudsey

Reggie. wrote: »

How much is a bag of it at the momemt

around 150/ton for gran or G-lime. Growmax is 180-200/ton but is 80% stronger. Look at TNV Total neutralising value) rate

Green farmer

Got a price of €173 a tonne from dairygold for granucal made by grassland agro. Not sure if it's better or worse then growmax.

Username John

Green farmer wrote: »

Got a price of €173 a tonne from dairygold for granucal made by grassland agro. Not sure if it's better or worse then growmax.

http://www.grasslandagro.ie/products/dairy-hygiene/products-range/granucal/
Says it had a neutralising value of 95

http://www.irishlime.ie/our-products/quicklime/growmax
Lists
Total neutralising value of Growmax is 160-170 compared to 95-99 for granulated limestone