Land Reclaimed What Now?

Ladeeen

Hi there, as the title suggests, recently had a digger in to reclaim about 8 acres that had been allowed to go wild with the last 30 years. The man did a fine job, cleared all vegetation, opened and made fine new drains etc.

The land is divided into two fields, one a big long narrow field of 5 acres and a smaller square field about 3. The bigger field was a lot wetter with blocked drains etc, so I will give that until next year before I do anything with it.

The smaller field however is in fairly good nick, that only had a maze of ferns growing on it which I was told was a sign of good fertility. My question is what would be the procedure for getting this field reseeded this year? Do I go the full whack and spray, spread lime/dung, plough harrow and seed, spray again?

I run a small suckler herd and a few stores so Ideally I would like 1 or 2 cuts of silage from this ground in the future.

Any and all advice appreciated thanks.

blue5000

If they are bare and level just shake grass seed on them. Or maybe redstart on the 3 acre drier field and put grass in it next year. If you do nothing it'll just be weeds until next year.

Ladeeen

So you're saying I would get away without ploughing or harrowing? The 3 acre field would be fairly level alright, I might just shake a bitta grass seed on it so. Any particular brand/mix you'd recommend?

Mooooo

I'd plough level and reseed with lime and whatever fert. If you have dung spread it on it before ploughing.
On the 5 acres that was wet I'd get a few bags of some cover crop seed and set it, would have a cover on it for the winter and help the soil for reseeding next year

Dinzee Conlee

Put in rape or something to clean the field, then reseed next spring.
If you had your own harrow, spreader and roller that’d do for putting out the rape...

If you just reseed now, the place will be covered with ferns and briars and probably furze in no time at all and you’ll be battling them with sprays for years... I have the T-shirt

Oh, on the grass seed to put in - I’d do a good bit of research into it, and what exactly you want from the ground / grass...
More mixture / diversity in the mix seems to be the way things are going - unless you want a very N dependant sward. But I think you said you’re beef farming so I imagine you’d prefer less N where possible...

Ladeeen

Thanks for the advice Dinzee. With the rape, would you recommend that on both fields or just the drier 3 acres that I had mentioned? Yes I will look into the grass seed mix, as you said a good diverse sward seems to be the way to go.