How to grow and harvest Super Napier Green Fodder for Dairy Farms

About Super Napier:

• Super Napier is a high yielding green fodder.

• Super Napier can yield 180 to 200 Tonnes per acre per year

• Its leaf length is 6 - 8 cm broad.

• They grow up to a high height 12 feet to 15 feet

• Super Napier has high crisp leaves.

• They have high leaf stem rate

• Super Napier can be harvested eight times a year

• The yield is made in a short period of time.

• Roots around the nodes can quickly grow.

  

How to plant Super Napier:​

• The soil should be well pulverized with the use of a rotavator

• The furrows are made 3 feet's apart.

• The cuttings are planted flat in the furrows, 2 feet's apart, and covered with soil one to two inches thick.

• 10,000 to 12,000 stems can be planted per acre

• After planting, irrigate to enhance germination.

• Always irrigate when necessary

  

How to irrigate Super Napier plants:

• Watering should be done on the third day.

• Irrigation should be done every 7 days depending on type of the soil

• Wastewater from the cattle shed can also be used for irrigation and is best source of manure.

• Super Napier grows well in all types of water. 

  

How to fertilizer Super Napier:

• 2 tons of organic fertilizer is recommended per acre or apply four bags of 14-14-14 fertilizer.

• 20 days after planting, apply cattle compost manure close to the stems

• Plow the land deep enough for the plant roots to penetration deep into the ground that make the plant drought resistant.

• After fertilizing the farm, the plants has to be irrigate well

  

Super Napier - 45 days after planting

• Super Napier grass will become robust, tufted and has a vigorous root system, developing from nodes of its creeping stolon's.

• Super Napier by this time would have grown up to 4 m to 7 m in height.

• They will form dense thick clumps, up to 1 m across.

• The leaves will be flat, linear, and hairy at the base, 100 cm to 120 cm long, 1 cm to 5 cm wide and bluish-green in color.

  

Super Napier - 90 days after planting

• Normally first harvest can be done after 90 days of planting and can be fed to cows and buffaloes

• It has other uses aside from fresh feed for farm animals.

• If there is excess harvest because there are not enough animals to eat the newly cut grass, the same could be shredded and made into silage.

• The shredded leaves and stalks could also be made into organic fertilizer by mixing the same with cattle manure.

• When shredded into fine particles, the same could be fed to vegetable-eating fish like tilapia and Pangasius.