Fall-planted cool-season annual forages make economical winter
feed for beef cows, say University of Missouri agronomists. They
say several annual forages, including annual ryegrass, wheat,
cereal rye, turnips and rape, can be fall-seeded for grazing in
late fall, winter and early spring. Using a computer model, they
compared the cost of those forages with that of stockpiled tall
fescue, tall fescue hay and alfalfa hay. The annual forages were
considered separately and in a limited number of combinations. A
spring-calving herd was fed from Dec. 1 to April 1. They found
that growing and grazing winter annuals is significantly less
costly than stockpiled tall fescue or hay. If stockpiled fescue
is assigned a relative cost of 100, annual ryegrass would have a
relative cost of 68. The most economical crop was turnips, with
a relative cost of 51. However, the researchers say that annual
ryegrass and cereal rye last longer and cost only slightly more
than turnips. And turnips should be consumed before Jan. 1 in
Mis