Oats

Introduction:

• Are Considered most important cereal fodder crop grown in Nepal during the winter season.
• Commonly called jai in most parts of Nepal.
• Oats are quick growing, palatable, succulent and nutritious and form an excellent combination when fed along with other winter season grasses such as berseem, lucerne, pea, vetch.
• They have many uses; a cereal, a feed grain to feed horses, sheep and poultry, green or conserved fodder.

Plant Characteristics

• Usually, oat is an erect annual with a fairly good tillering habit.
• The panicles are jax and effuse.
• The main axis and lateral branches end in a single apical spikelet.
• The grain is long and slender or spindle shaped and usually covered with fine hair at the upper end.

Climatic requirements

• Thrives best under cool and moist conditions.
• A well distributed rainfall of 400 mm during the four months duration is sufficient to meet its requirements.
• Doesn’t tolerate frost and severe cold whereas hot and dry conditions hasten its maturity.

Soil:

• Fertile and well drained loam to clay loam is best.
• Can tolerate slight acid or saline, but not with pH above 8.5.

Field preparation, manuring and sowing

• 25t FYM, 65kg Urea, 200 kg SSP and 50 kg MOP per hectare.
• Use of 75-80 Kg seeds/ha for small seeded varieties, and 100-125 kg for bold seeded varieties.

Harvesting

• Should be done after the initiation of flowering upto 50% bloom.
• When grown with legumes, the mixture should be harvested when neither of them has over matured.

Animal Health

• In case of heavy use of fertilizer, lot of nitrates ay accumulate, particularly in hay.
• If such hay is moistened for 8-10 days and exposed to air, the nitrates are reduced to nitrites.
• Such hay if fed to animals converts the hemoglobin of the blood into methemoglobin which can not act as an oxygen carrier.

Yields

• Average yield varies from 350-400 q/ha with the maximum yield of 550-600 q as well.