triticale or fall rye?

[cowman]

Last year, for the first time, we tried some swath grazing. Just barley as it was handy and we were too busy with other things to mess around with it.
My Dad used to grow fall rye for grazing cattle years ago. He planted it around the end of June. He either took off a hay crop before it headed or flogged the cows into it about mid August...as near as I could remember? I do know it stayed green way into fall and you could practically see the calves pound on the weight? This was a pretty common practice for many purebred breeders so they could advertize "no creep" while still feeding those calves a very lush feed.
In the spring that fall rye was up and green as soon as the snow started to melt. By the first of May it was ready to graze! It allowed us time to let the regular pastures to get off to a good start. After they went to grass he sprayed the rye out with roundup and usually got a barley crop planted.
My neighbor grew triticale a couple of years ago and he had steers out on it the last week of April. They grazed it down to the dirt and by fall it came back in a real nice stand that he combined.
We are considering experimenting this spring with our little swath grazing plot experiment with either fall rye or triticale? Swath graze late fall and hopefully have some really early pasture next spring? About May 1st I get awful lazy when it comes to feeding cows!
So is there any advantage to triticale over fall rye or visa versa? And also can you grow these crops again and again or do you need to do a rotation for disease?

[Ron]

I talked with a dairy guy last summer who was growing fall rye (three cuts of silage in the second year), asked him why not triticale, he said winter kill was better on rye, seed was way cheaper.
The first year you only get vegetative growth on trit (not sure about rye). Lots of grass but the heads will be few and empty. If the trit gets too mature the second year the stems get like sticks. Grazing hard in the spring should set it back enough for staging when you swath for grazing (you did want to swath graze both years?)

[cowman]

Well actually Ron I was thinking swath graze in the fall the first year and then graze it hard in the spring and spray it out and then replant around mid June? I'm not all that familiar with triticale but with fall rye you can't let it go to seed or its done?
My old man was a big fan of fall rye and even combined it one year, but I can't remember all the ins and outs of it. I do know it grew lush as hell and it went through the cows pretty good and they sure liked it.
If I remember right it was kind of tough breaking it up as it had a good root system and the moles would not go into a field of fall rye.