<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Chokepoint</div><div class="ubbcode-body">How do deer forage on sugar beets?
Local farmers are planting them now and I have not seen deer on them. The web says deer love the foliage and root. How do they get at the root in winter.
Would the beets not be inaccessible in frozen ground?
Do they have to be tilled up for them to get at them?
Are the tops like brassicas that stay palatable in cold winter?
A web source says them are not brassicas yet I saw here they are. </div></div>
For weed control purposes I "lumped" them in with brassicas because in that respect they are very similar.
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Brassica (Brás-si-ca) is a genus of plants in the mustard family (Brassicaceae).
Sugar beet (Beta vulgaris L.), a member of the Chenopodiaceae family,
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Beyond that...they have tops and roots very much like turnips and swedes, they can produce tons of forage but I'm not certain how well they would grow on much of our soils.
Deer will eat the roots especially in states where baiting is allowed but in the field they would have to eat the root like a turnip...while it's in the ground.
Most sugar beets are grown on very fertile soil often with irrigation...how they would compare with other crops, how deer would use them compared to other crops...is something that one would have to test for themselves.
Like brassicas...deer may react differently to them and I suspect that they would learn to feed on them in late winter after other crops are gone.
SB would be planted in early spring and would require herbicide. RR seed is now becoming available but for good yields one would also have to plan on copious amounts of fertlizer, especially nitrogen.
Fertilizing Sugar Beets
Sugar beets would be something I would try on a small scale where you can use a cam to moniter usage...personally I haven't grown them so I'd rather not comment on pros and cons. /forum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smile.gif
