All districts of the Vitebsk region have joined the harvesting of silage corn

August 22, Vitebsk / Sergey Kotovets - BELTA/. All districts of the Vitebsk region have joined the work on harvesting fodder corn, the Agriculture and Food Committee of the regional executive committee informed a BELTA correspondent.

As of August 22, more than 4.7 thousand hectares of this crop have been mown, which is 4.5% of the planned harvesting areas. The gross harvest of green mass amounted to about 135.8 thousand tons with an average yield of 287.2 centners per hectare. This work is being carried out most actively in the Braslav district, where a quarter of the crop's sowings have already been harvested (almost 1.1 thousand hectares). Farms in the Polotsk district are obtaining the highest yield, with this indicator reaching 518 centners per hectare (about 3.2% of the total corn sowing area has been mown).

In total, this year the region's cornfields have expanded by 25% to 100 thousand hectares compared to 2010. Among the districts, the largest area of corn sowings is in the Tolochin district (over 8.1 thousand hectares) and the Vitebsk district (almost 7 thousand hectares). In the Vitebsk region, the main volume of silage is to be prepared from corn; under favorable weather conditions, part of this crop may be harvested for grain.

The second mowing of grasses has been carried out on an area of over 74.6 thousand hectares, which is 57.4% of the target. In total, about 741 thousand tons of fodder units have been harvested, or 58.3% of the target. The provision of fodder per one conventional head of cattle in the region on average is almost 16 centners of fodder units. Farms have harvested almost 160 thousand tons of hay, or 156% of the planned amount, as well as over 2.2 million tons of haylage (107% of the plan). Silage has been harvested in the amount of about 202 thousand tons, including almost 100 thousand tons from corn.

All farms in the region have begun harvesting flax shives.-0-