Converting Cold season grass to clover

[NoviceTreeGuy]

I have a 1.5 acre grass field I would like to convert to a clover field.

I am taking a soil sample to determine ph and other deficiencies.

I’m In Southwest IL.

When should I terminate the grass ? Is glyphosate herbicide ok or should I use something else?

Can I frost seed clover in February?
If not, when would you broadcast seed?

Thank you!!

 

[RGrizzzz]

I have a 1.5 acre grass field I would like to convert to a clover field.

I am taking a soil sample to determine ph and other deficiencies.

I’m In Southwest IL.

When should I terminate the grass ? Is glyphosate herbicide ok or should I use something else?

Can I frost seed clover in February?
If not, when would you broadcast seed?

Thank you!!

Frost seed when the days are above freezing and the nights are below. The freeze thaw cycle will work the seed into the soil. When th grass starts growing you want to spray it with a grass selective herbicide. Clehtodim is the most commonly used. Read the label ahead of time to make sure you have the proper adjuvants. (Usually non-ionic surfactant)

 

[Turkey Creek]

If you want the best way, burn it off in late February, wait for the grass to green up and then hit it with glyphosate (spraying now will give you less than desirable results). Clethodim will work, but not nearly as well as glyphosate, and since you are looking to establish a clover plot, anything other than clover would be reducing the chance for a solid stand of clover. I would still broadcast the seed after the grass is killed off, it will likely be too late for frost seeding, but it wont matter.

 

[yoderjac]

I would not frost seed at all. You will likely be wasting money on clover seed that will soon be encroached upon with cool season grasses like fescue. I find it best to spend a season killing the cool season grasses. I would start in late spring by spraying gly surface broadcasting and cultipacking buckwheat. Buckwheat will come up quickly and provide some summer deer food, but the real purpose here is to help control weeds. By avoiding tillage to reduce bringing new grass and weed seeds into the germination layer.

In the fall, I'd wait until it gets cool and cool season grasses start growing again. I'd then spray with gly and surface broadcast perennial clover with a winter rye nurse crop. The winter rye helps combat weeds and lets the clover get established. The first spring, each time the winter rye gets 12-18 inches tall , mow the field back to 6-8 inches. This will release the clover but keep the WR alive fighting weeds until it naturally dies.

Best of luck.

 

[gurgalunas]

Agree that the seed bank will cause problems with the cool season grass (CSG) coming back, which will pretty much require starting over in a few years. I've been down this path myself after I got my current place back in 2008 and was a newb with plotting. My experience: first year, spray Gly, disk, seed in spring, the clover plot looked great. Second year, the grass that sprouted but unseen starts to fill in and begins crowding the clover. By year 3, its mostly grass, like you never did anything... I wasted 3 years learning this lesson, and started again from where I was day 1. Be patient with getting to the ultimate goal and take your time to get it right, and you'll be ahead of the game. Now I always plant a RR crop for a couple seasons when converting CSG. You get a food source while also having the opportunity to clean up the CSG that sprouts. Once you get a couple years of roundup on the plot, you should be good to plant the clover, as long as you don’t do any major tillage (bringing new seed to the surface to sprout).

 

[RGrizzzz]

Agree that the seed bank will cause problems with the cool season grass (CSG) coming back, which will pretty much require starting over in a few years. I've been down this path myself after I got my current place back in 2008 and was a newb with plotting. My experience: first year, spray Gly, disk, seed in spring, the clover plot looked great. Second year, the grass that sprouted but unseen starts to fill in and begins crowding the clover. By year 3, its mostly grass, like you never did anything... I wasted 3 years learning this lesson, and started again from where I was day 1. Be patient with getting to the ultimate goal and take your time to get it right, and you'll be ahead of the game. Now I always plant a RR crop for a couple seasons when converting CSG. You get a food source while also having the opportunity to clean up the CSG that sprouts. Once you get a couple years of roundup on the plot, you should be good to plant the clover, as long as you don’t do any major tillage (bringing new seed to the surface to sprout).

Why didn't you try spraying a grass selective herbicide?