In April 2024, Pioneer Seeds Territory Sales Manager Chris Rutland visited Rodney and Elizabeth Skene on their cattle stud farm, Meldon Park Simmentals, in Cecil Plains Queensland, to check out their 2023-2024 crop of Mega Feed summer forage.
A new addition to the product portfolio in 2023, Pioneer brand Mega Feed is an ultra-late maturity, all-rounder forage sorghum x sudan grass. The hybrid is perfectly suited to grazing, baling and silage not only for its increased palatability, high sugar content and strong early vigour, but also for its ability to retain high feed quality late into the season.
With the expert advice from Clancy Cosgrove from Agri Shed, the cattle breeders at Meldon Park Simmentals planted one of the very first commercial crops of the new hybrid forage in September 2023, and have grazed the crop with cows, calves and bulls intermittently throughout the season. The overall feedback provided by the growers and agronomist was positive, as they were impressed by the flexibility that the ultra-late maturity awarded to them, the high leaf-to-stem ratio and the standability of the forage.
Rodney was especially pleased with the late heading of the crop.
"The thing that impresses me is, it's so late to run up to head. We've had, and have, other [hybrids] here at the moment that were planted a lot later and have just gone straight to head, so I think that's a huge advantage," he said.
Clancy recommended the new hybrid as a low-maintenance, longer-term solution for the grower.
"They'd never grown it before, no one ever had, so thought it was the right [hybrid] for the situation we were we had here. There's no other feed anywhere and Liz had the cows that needed to be somewhere for a long period of time. We chose this and it worked out pretty well," he said.
For more about Pioneer brand Mega Feed, you can view the technical fact sheet here.
With dedicated and highly skilled team members located throughout Australia you can be sure of accessing the best local knowledge to help you maximise your investment in Pioneer® brand hybrid seed. Get in touch with your local Territory Sales Manager or Farm Services Consultant today.