fall rye vs winter wheat

[Ronski]

Thinking of a winter crop since it looks like canola will be swathed next week here.
Anyone have experience on hybrid rye vs winter wheat in a (usually) high rainfall, cool night, high yielding area?

Probably a light harrow after harvest, wait for regrowth, spray and seed into the stubble? Conserve moisture in case this is a 2 year event.
Any thoughts?

[goalieguy847]

Hi ronski.
where about are you located?

Im by edmonton and we love growing both crops.
However, up here our only reliable option to seed it behind is peas and they stink the last few yrs.

Rye is super susceptible to ergot but its hardy as hell. On our poor land we avgd 80 bpa and had yields as high as 145 on a good 80 ac piece ( this was in a yr where our spring wheats avgd 60 to 70).
Some newer varieties supposed to be much better against ergot ... super expensive seed tho. At the time ( 2 yrs ago) i think it was 60$/ ac. Ridiculous.

Winter wheat is a great option too but NOT if your land is prone to spring floods during that freeze/ thaw period we usually get up here in march.
Newest variety wildfire is a definite yield boost over moats.
IF YOU seed treat with raxil they USED to cover your " equivalent rate" for free if the crop failed. Crop insurance covers seeding/ seed cost if it fails as well so no real loss other than time/ fuel.

Preburn with straight florasulam. 30 lbs N and a bit more phos than usual to help roots boom.
In spring you can topdress however with additional N as soon as you can get on the field without getting stuck.

Wouldnt seed later than sept 10th ( up here) in our area and it really does need to germ and get to 2 leaf stage to have high% to survive.

In 2021 when it was super drought..our spring wheats did 20 to 25
Barley single digits.. and 400 ac of winter wheat avgd just under 60. Its incredible how it utilizes the snow catch.
We havd grown it about 7 times and it has always been our top yielding wheat beating out CPS and soft white the 1 yr we grew it. If its good growing conditions for spring wheat then its good foe winter wheat.

Also, NEVER had to use an incrop graminicide. It always out competes and chokes out the wild oats. Thats a 20 to 25$/ ac saving.

Personally,
i believe its a no brainer crop to grow with poor subsoil moisture like the situation we are in. Its just a difficult sell to the rest of the crew to pull out the drill and time everything properly while usually spraying/ swathing/ thrashing.

Wildfire winter wheat. Dont bother with anything else.

Any new fall rye variety from secan. Trebiano/ guttino.. etc.

hope this helps. Can discuss further if have more questions.

Also.
1 mans opinion only!

[shtferbrains]

Good summery by gg847.

Only thing I might add is seed as shallow as you think you can get away with on winter Wht.
Theory is the winter kill is worse if you seed deep the freeze/thaw breaks the white shoot between the plant and the roots.

Do the ethanol plants buy it?

Marketing used to be a pia as nobody had a bin for it.

As above some significant savings on inputs possible?

[13stripe]

For me it has been a good way to mitigate weather risk as last few years one rain event and then dry and hot and reduce wild oat control costs and herbicide resistance.
Neighbour sold to permalex one year and was happy.

[Ronski]

I am near Lacombe. My Canola here is a total wreck on one quarter as it is very sandy and blasted horribly. I am guessing 15-20 bushels max. I am going to soil test once it is swathed and see how much N is still there. If I have reasonable N carryover (at least 30 lbs) can I just use 40 lbs of actual P (80 lbs of 11-52-0) with the seed and broadcast the rest of the N in early spring? I usually add 100-120lbs N on HRS wheat with yield target of 90-100 bushels. Same program for winter wheat?
Thanks for the info, I am trying to make something good of this early/ugly harvest.

[shtferbrains]

You might consider unlike HRS you won't be paid for protein if you ship to ethanol plants.

[goalieguy847]

Mmmm whens the last time we were paid for protein? Lol
cent a tenth? Big whoop!

but in seriousness.. used to sell winter wheat for feed but it generally makes cps grade ( thru one of the big elevators...they buy as CP plus so you get cps price.) Last 3 times we grew it was marketed as CP plus).

Even if you had 0 leftover nitrogen you could.just seed it with phos. Then hammer it with N in the spring. Its a flexible crop in that it can be split apped ( or front loaded N which isnt recommended) and still achieve max potential yield. As well, it does NOT require the same moisture as spring wheat to germ. Alot less. Usually whats leftover from.harvest residue and fall dews can get it going.