Jamesons can offer a complete range of game cover crops including straights and specialist mixtures. Game cover crops provide a range of solutions for those who want to offer habitat for game birds. Some crops provide feed alone, others cover and some supply both.
Straight species
Annual feed & cover
Quinoa – seed bearing crop which sheds up to 1 tonne an acre of high protein seed. Best sown with a companion crop usually with kale, e.g. Kingmix sold in acre packs.
Sunflower – large attractive seed heads that are an important feed source. Best sown with other game species, e.g. maize.
Game cover maize – blend of early and late maturing maize varieties with good standing ability, some feed value. Seed treated with an insecticide and fungicide. Sold in acre packs.
Triticale – ideal for gamecover, tolerates low soil pH (down to 4.9), resilient to rabbit attack, provides feed for game birds in autumn.
Longer term solutions
Reed canary grass – perennial crop for poor or exposed sites, produces a tick stand in the second year, lasts up to seven years. Best sown in wide rows (70 – 90 cm). Mustard is sometimes used as a nurse crop in the first year.
Sweet clover (yellow blossom) – biennial plant that thrives on neutral and calcareous soils. Second year growth can reach 1-2 m in height. Best sown in conjunction with kale or reed canary grass in adjacent rows.
Chicory – biennial crop providing an excellent tall cover in the second year, best to grow with a nurse crop in the first year such as mustard.
Mixtures for feed and cover
Setter – two year crop for cover and feed. Sown in May giving cover from September to February. Contains kale, maize, sunflower, millet, buckwheat, mustard, sweet clover and phacelia.
Labrador – full season cover and feed, suitable for cooler and more exposed areas. Contains rabbit tolerant triticale, with kale, linseed, mustard and quinoa.
Wild bird mixture – this is a spring mixture consisting of 70% triticale, 15% kale and 15% quinoa. Spring sown ideally on field margins and headlands.
Mixtures for recovery and patching game crops
Rejuvenator – seed mixture for thin or failed game crops, consists of brassicas mustard, forage rape and stubble turnips.
Last ditch attempt – this mixture will continue to give some cover at the end of the season to hold game birds for the next year, lasting for up to 5 years. Contains chicory, reed canary grass, forage rape, fodder radish and mustard.