Alamo Switchgrass?

Has anyone planted any with good results? This was actually recommended from a habitat solution company that was planting foodplots on my neighbors farm. Why he hired someone to do his planting is beyond me. It is supposed to grow with minimal rainfall. What research I have done shows it does well in Texas so should grow here just fine.I'm in Arkansas.

Now for planting, someone educate me. When to plant? How to plant? Pounds per acre? I have read to plant 1/4 to 1/2 inch deep but it seems it could be broadcasted on top of the ground before a good rain. Like nature does it or am I that far off? I have some areas that I want to burn off and plant some.

deer patch,

The best advice you can find anywhere can be found at the following link. When you get to the page, go to the bottom right and download the free guide to establishing native grasses. These guys are experts and the free brochure leads you right through everything you need to know. I do know that getting seed too deep is one of the greatest causes of failure. I would say 1/4 inch is about right and 1/2 inch is pushing it. Also, getting a good kill on the competition is important too. Good luck.

https://roundstoneseed.com/

I have planted several small areas and strips on my place in North Alabama with good results. I sprayed dialed and planted some spots and others I just sprayed sowed and bushhogged. Both ways have worked well but disking worked the best. In about 3 years it was doing good and well over my head. I have not seen much used for bedding but it has worked well in strips for screenings.


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Thanks guys for the input. I have read a lot of info about planting and the best way to plant by far is a drill but that's not going to happen where I want to plant. So I will most likely burn early spring and spread seed then drag something to cover the seed with.

I had a good conversation with dgallow on Sunday about switchgrass and he recommended planting Alamo and Kanlow as a mixture in my area so I will probably do the mixture.

If anyone else has anymore suggestions I would like to here them.

It’s been a while since I’ve researched switchgrass. A few years back, when I was looking into it pretty seriously, it seemed like everyone was recommending cave-in-rock switch. At that time, the consensus on that variety was that it held up the best under a snow load. Has that opinion changed?

Marty Edwards said:

It’s been a while since I’ve researched switchgrass. A few years back, when I was looking into it pretty seriously, it seemed like everyone was recommending cave-in-rock switch. At that time, the consensus on that variety was that it held up the best under a snow load. Has that opinion changed?

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That's what I have, and it stands the winter well.

I picked Alama because of drought resistance and soil conditions. I can't find how drought resistant cave-in-rock is online. Can anyone tell me total yearly rainfall it takes to grow?

The following link should help you. According to the test results there, Alamo is more resistant to drought than CIR. I would read the conclusions first and then go back and dig into the data if you want more information.

https://biotechnologyforbiofuels.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13068-015-0342-8

If the old Doubletree (Paul Knox) information is still available somewhere on the Internet, I would trust his findings more than anyone else. He was in it for the habitat building. I read all that information years ago, but don't recall the specific difference between the different switchgrass cultivars. But, i do remember that he was high on CIR.

I planted kanlow and blackwell in Kansas,most areas have had a switch grass developed for their state.The other thing about switch is that it can be planted with a regular drill if unbearded seed.One way I have done is to do burn down with gly in fall and drill wheat then early spring drill switch seed after spraying wheat with gly.I have also frost seeded switch before a late snow which works better on a prepared seedbed but studies have shown it grows faster and thicker first year doing this

Thanks Native for the link.

Buck...I may do a combination of both frost seeding and planting later in the year sometime around May. I was told frost seeding didn't work very well but after your post and all the reading I have done that seems to be a good way to get it started. Thanks for posting.