BiColor Lespedeza Food Plot Bare Root Plants

Facts About BiColor Shrub Lespedeza Bare Root Plants

Sold in Bundles of 1000 total plants (Bare Root plants)
Plants ship direct from Oklahoma or South Carolina via United Parcel Service.
Plants usually ship on Monday's only for order placed previous week.

Bare root plants - Ships from December into March. Size about 12-15 inches. Plant in rows 3 feet apart. Space plants every 18-24 inches. Works out to about a 3x3 foot pattern. Or plant in rows near woods / fence rows.  Plant original rooting depth (look at contract on plant to determine original depth.  Deer browse the foliage and Quail love to eat the seeds of these varieties.  Provides a good source of late winter feed for Quail.  Plants should be watered when received and will generally last okay with proper watering and care for 7-14 days. Plant ASAP for best planting success. Bicolor Lespedeza seeds are also available.

BiColor Shrub Lespedeza Food Plot Facts

BiColor Lespedeza is used for wildlife food plot and cover in hedges and border plantings. The seeds from these plants are a desirable fall and winter food for pheasants, bobwhite quail, and other birds. Rabbit and deer will often browse the foliage. Honeybees like the flowers and produce a quality honey from them. Like other types of Bicolor, the masses of late summer blooms are an attractive landscaping feature.

Bi-Color Shrub Lespedeza Characteristics

Bicolor Shrub lespedeza is an excellent shrub that grows to around 6 to 8 feet in height. A slow starter the first year, the shrub starts producing seed in the second year. It provides excellent cover during the summer and winter months and is ideal for stream or ditch banks, the edges of woods, or small comers of hard-to-farm areas. It can also be used as a low hedgerow with other plantings on either side. Lespedeza has shown no indication of spreading into agriculture fields. It can be used alongside or in combination with other plants. A particularly productive combination for wildlife improvement is to use switchgrass and lespedeza as complementary plantings. The lespedeza provides excellent food and some cover, while the switchgrass remains standing most of the winter, providing quality cover. However, switchgrass should not be permitted to invade the bicolor stand (plant separate stands). Bicolor lespedeza stands should remain relatively open at ground level..

Planting Bi-Color Shrub type Lespedeza

Prepare a clean, firm, weed-free seedbed. plant in rows or pattern as described above. Once the lespedeza is established, weeds are seldom a problem. It is best to plant 1/8 to 1/4 acre plots with 300 feet in between. Lespedeza grows well in all soil types except deep sand or extreme lime soils. The flowers appear in late summer and are pink to purple. The seeds are black.

Seed maturity ranges from late September to early October. Bi-Color lespedeza produces between 300 to 500 pounds of seed per acre per year.  Apply fertilizer before or at the time of planting or seeding. Fertilize according to soil test. If no test is available, apply 300 to 500 pounds per acre of 0-12-12 or 0-20-20 fertilizer. Lime to 6.5 if pH is below 5.5.

Do not use a nurse crop when seeding. Lespedeza can be planted no-till, but existing weeds and vegetation need to be killed prior to planting to eliminate competition. Weed control might be required the first year. This is best accomplished by mowing when the weeds are 18 to 24 inches tall and clipping them to the same height as the lespedeza.

Adaptation Of Bi-Color Shrub type Lespedeza

Lespedeza can be used on soils that are droughty, well drained, or somewhat poorly drained. It does not do well in poorly drained soils. Seed maturity requires a growing season of approximately 160 frost-free days.

Facts About Bi-Color Lespedeza

This is a perennial plant available in both seed and as bare root plants/shrubs for wildlife planting. About 8-12 different varieties exist of Lespedeza. Bicolor (101) Common Lespedeza is one of the more popular varieties of Lespedeza planted due to the fact that the stems remain alive (above ground) over the winter period.

Bi-color is also the most favored variety of Deer. Seeds are edible and attract Quail. Deer tend to graze on plant foliage more than the seeds. Excellent for more Northern areas where frost can occur before mid-October. These varieties also tend to drop mature seeds late in fall/winter providing winter food for Quail.

Lespedeza Shrub Planting suggestions:

• Plant in rows 36" inches apart (No more than 42"as the plants must shade the ground area when the mature in about 2-3 years).
• Plant spacing should be around 18 - 28" apart.
• Plant in winter to early spring before sap starts rising (spring green up).

• Plant depth of bare root plants to "collar" on top of root system. (Generally this is original rooting depth and is identifiable by it's different color on the bare root plant.)

• Plant plants in winter or early spring.  Seeds can be planted in early spring around date of last expected frost.

Make sure you do not plant your rows too wide, as the plant needs to shade ground in order to choke and keep out weeds. Bicolor matures in 2-3 years. Best for well-drained soils, but NOT high sandy soils. Fertilizer at 500 lbs / acre with a low N fertilizer. Seeds require about 4 years to fully mature. Plants mature faster because of their 12-24 month head start as a bare root plant when starting.

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