Double-cropping with forage sorghum and forage triticale in New York: Best timing for sorghum harvest and triticale planting
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Abstract
Double-cropping with both warm and cool-season forages in New York can have many benefits, including providing a source of forage yield in the spring that potentially leads to greater total season yields than a monocrop system, increasing rotation diversity, and providing year-round soil cover. Winter cereals such as triticale are great options for double-cropping in the Northeast, as they overwinter and can produce high forage yields in the spring. Yet, depending on weather and growing season condition, a winter cereal crop harvested for forage can delay corn silage planting to mid-May or later. Sorghum is a potentially useful alternative to corn silage for double cropping rotations, as sorghum can be planted later than corn. While it is possible to harvest forage sorghum earlier than the recommended soft-dough growth stage without compromising yield, it was not known how sorghum harvest timing would impact total season yield of both forage crops in the rotation. Here we present findings of a field trial to evaluate the impact of sorghum harvest timing on the combined yield of forage triticale and forage sorghum in a double cropping rotation.