Fontanelle, IA | ReinholdFarms - 1/7/2026 14:33
Late this Fall/ early winter I had the opportunity to Rent a piece very local to me that has been in hay production for around 8-10 years. I plan to plant it to beans this spring. Due to when I got access to the piece it was too late/ weather turned to where I couldn’t get any tillage/ burn down done last fall. So my question is how should I tackle this farm come spring? Do I set in early with burn down and follow with a chisel plow to bury the sod and follow with a pass or two with the disk? Or do I burn it down and attempt to no till beans right into the sod? I personally don’t have a lot of experience no tilling beans in situations like this. How bad is weed pressure going to be if I no till? Very little alfalfa left in the stand due to mis management. Young guy starting out here so any advice is very much appreciated and welcome. Thanks
keep it simple.
If the alfalfa is basically played out after 8-10 years of mismanagement (your words/not mine), then all you are going to be killing out are weeds and perennial grasses. SOIL Sample so you know where you're starting from. Max rate of Gly with 2-4D in the burndown with your flavor of residuals. NoTill the beans in early. Enlist Beans. Get beans planted early. Don't take a cutting of hay UNLESS you are going to get PAID for the forage (meaning worth your time and fertility replacement). Spray your post emerge about 3-4 weeks after you notill plant the beans to kill original grass sod stragglers that just didnt know they were supposed to die from the early spring burndown.
YOu can flip this same Rx script for corn - but realize that incompletely killed sod grass competition is HELL on corn yields- so you need to take it out like bunker-buster bombs to a Iranian nuclear reactor. Zero N credits because Zero alfalfa left in stand -so full snort of commercial Nitrogen. High rate seed treatment (wireworms and grubs)
good luck and Congratulations! |
Putting Hayfield back into Row Crop Production
