Green globe turnips - improving pasture
Green Globe turnips are being used on Westrange Station as a development tool to turn poor performing browntop-based hill blocks into improved pasture.
"We are using Green Globe on steep faces that we can't get a tractor over," says Derek who farms the Eastern Bush sheep and dairy grazing property with his wife Bronnie.
Each block is double sprayed with glyphosate prior to sowing. Fertility is improved with 3t/ha of lime and 500kg of Super 10. It is then oversown by air at 1.2kg/ha - 900g/ha of Ultrastrike Green Globe turnips and 300g of Ultrastrike Major Plus swedes. Sown at the end of November, the block was to be grazed in late July/early August by in-lamb ewes before being put into new grass pasture in spring. Blocks of 52ha and 25ha have now been developed, with another 40ha block lined up.
"This year's crop of Green Globe is around 7-8t/ha which is impressive as we weren't expecting anything near that tonnage. I'm more than happy with it breaking in that type of country," says Derek.
