Game Cover Mixtures

pheasantJamesons 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.