As title states, a nearby farm has planted these. Its fall, very wet out' and drops to freezing temps often. Best piture I could grab from my car. They normally plant winter wheat, corn, a bean plant, or let it go to nature for a year. No one else has planted this. Upon this picture, we are believing its in the kale family but its a bad area to stop for a better look. Thanks! (Have a great holiday or weekend!)
by Prunger
8 Comments
Looks like possibly the tops of something that’s underneath the ground? Like turnips maybe?
Yes, they are definitely the tops of a root vegetable in the cabbage family; probably a cover crop for winter to prevent soil erosion and/or give winter forage for livestock.
Looks similar to kohlrabi
I guess kohlrabi
[‘Tillage radish’](https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2024-07/Radish%20Cover%20Crop%20Fact%20Sheet_0.pdf) used as cover crop. They have several desirable attributes – high biomass, weed suppression, compaction mitigation, etc. They smell bad when decomposing in the spring. Usually planted in a mix. There’s a beautiful field of them a couple miles north of me in a field that raised processing tomatoes this past season. Beautiful green and growing where all the other fields are brown and stubble. They are killed at about 15*F and so will not make it thru the winter here.
Judging by the root stems, radish
Looks like rapeseed to me (leaf shape and bluish color), it’s a common winter crop here in Germany, but there’s other crops in Brassica that look similar. If you are familiar with the smell of the flowers, the leaves smell a bit like it, but it’s not a strong smell.
I think you’re right that it’s a winter cover crop and a brassica but the leaves look more like canola to me