United Kingdom
February 6, 2025
Good grass mixtures contribute hugely to lowering production costs, but as a sward ages, its yield and feed quality decreases significantly. This is caused largely by the ingress of lower yielding, lower quality weed grasses.
Now is a great time to take a good look at all your grass fields and if you can answer ‘yes’ to any of these questions then it would be worth considering the various options that are open to you.
Key Questions to Assess the Health of your grass
Q: Are your leys struggling to support the numbers of livestock they did in the past?
Q: Is the speed of re-growth after silage cuts slower than it was?
Q: Have your fields been attacked badly by pests and/or diseases in recent years?
Q: Do you see more and more patchy areas on some fields?
Q: Is the population of weeds and weed grass much higher than you thought?
Q: Have your fields been badly poached in recent years?
Q: Do you detect a reduction in the amount of silage being taken off each field every season?
Q: Has the level of broad-leaved weed infestation been rising?
Q: Could you make better use of the high feeding value of legumes like White Clover?
You have various options if you have answered ‘yes’ to any or all of these questions. It may be that in some cases you will be able to bring the ley back up to speed by close attention to the control of weeds and pests.
Alternatively, it may be necessary either to consider a complete re-seed or perhaps an overseeding operation.
Why is reseeding so important?
Reseeding gives the opportunity to replace older varieties and weed grasses with the newest genetics that offer a multitude of benefits.
The key point to remember is that it is important not to look at the cost of reseeding but instead consider the cost of not reseeding!
More information
Learn more about our high performance grass mixtures here or contact your usual seed merchant for availability
Download the grass mixture selection guide here
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