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Post by northshoretrapper on Apr 16, 2012 7:40:18 GMT -5
Had a very busy weekend, got a lot accomplished. Cleaned out the barnyard (all the wasted round bale remains and of course the other waste) and spread all the contents . Put up new insulators to add more fence this upcoming weekend. Whenever the cows see me working on fence they think i am adding more pasture for them. They start mooing, then beller'in, then bawling and wont stop until i give them pasture, lol. So i got annoyed quite quickly with them being mouthy and the darn black flies...so i gave in and let them into one of their pastures. The pastures still have a few more weeks to grow before i actually want the cows out in them...but a couple hours didnt hurt nothing. After spreading all the hay/manure on the pastures we got a real nice slow soaking rain all afternoon and last night. Should make the grass jump right up now!!
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Post by marion on Apr 16, 2012 9:34:28 GMT -5
Ah, spring! Isn't it great ;D
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Post by jneail on Apr 16, 2012 15:25:21 GMT -5
Maybe mine haven't caught on yet- I had to lead them to the gate for the new pasture. EVERY SINGLE ONE of them. Now they won't leave it!
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Post by lakeportfarms on Apr 17, 2012 8:18:59 GMT -5
Here in Michigan we're actually getting grass almost long enough to start grazing. I've never had them on pasture until mid-May before. It's been dry here too until the last couple of days, and the rain we had really gave the grass a good boost.
When you do "mob grazing", like we do, the cows come running to you whenever you're walking out there. We usually move them twice a day in strips of grass between 5 and 10 feet wide depending on how many cows and how long the cross fence is.
I've been fine tuning how we handle the temporary hot fencing that we use for our rotational grazing, mainly in how we make the connection to the fencing and then to the hot fence. I got some 3/4" PVC and cut them to about 16", then drilled holes in the ends. We use a bungee cord to attach to the fence, and a large metal ring on the other end to attach the rubber handle at one end. We just tie the polytwine on the other end depending on the length of the run (it is variable). On that end we leave the remaining polytwine on the spool and set it on the ground. They are just $8 extension cord reels from Lowes. We were giving it a try yesterday in anticipation of getting them out soon and it seems to work well. I'll set up 4 or 5 days worth of moves at a time, so the time to move them to a new strip is maybe 10 minutes total. We'll close up the back side every three days to give the grazed area a rest of at least 25 days in the spring, and maybe 45 or so during the summer depending on the rain and temperatures.
Previously I was just using some 14 ga wire with donuts at the ends, but I was grabbing the HOT side too often when disconnecting it from the fence. Hopefully the long white PVC puts an end to those early morning jolts ;D
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Post by marion on Apr 17, 2012 12:34:42 GMT -5
Previously I was just using some 14 ga wire with donuts at the ends, but I was grabbing the HOT side too often when disconnecting it from the fence. Hopefully the long white PVC puts an end to those early morning jolts ;D They sell zappers for humans, but farmers don't need them. You are probably parasite free ;D
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Post by midhilldexters on Apr 17, 2012 14:58:47 GMT -5
Lakeport, do you have a pic of the pvc end you are talking about, would love to see it. It may come in handy here.
Carol K
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Post by midhilldexters on Apr 17, 2012 15:02:41 GMT -5
"You are probably parasite free "
Marion, you crack me up! ;D
Carol
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Post by lakeportfarms on Apr 17, 2012 19:37:59 GMT -5
Lakeport, do you have a pic of the pvc end you are talking about, would love to see it. It may come in handy here. Carol K Have you had some morning jolts too? I'll get one in the next couple days...I have a few busy days ahead of me at work.
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Post by lakeportfarms on May 9, 2012 7:50:00 GMT -5
Lakeport, do you have a pic of the pvc end you are talking about, would love to see it. It may come in handy here. Carol K Carol, (and others that may have been interested) sorry for the delay, it's been busy at work and I finally got some photos of the temp fencing since we've now started the managed grazing. I cut 12" sections of 3/4" PVC and drilled holes right near the ends. Then I got some inexpensive short bungees and permanently attached one end and crimped it to one of the holes, leaving the other free to wrap around the pole and attach in the other hole. The other end I put a binder ring on which serves as the end to attach the gate handle to (which is permanently attached to the reel of polywire), and at the other end I simply run the polywire around and tie it so it is "adjustable" to the length of the temporary run. I have thousands of the binder clips and that is why I used them, but you could use some other way to soften the connection so it doesn't make a sharp edge to wear or snap the polywire where it connects. The wire is stored on simple plastic extension cord reels, which allow them to sit on the ground and not short the hot wire. They were about 8 dollars each and they roll up fairly quickly. This inexpensive way allows us to set up 5-6 days worth of moves at a time (we run up to 4 different pastures simultaneously so we have about 30 temporary lines set up at a time!). We have a lot of metal pigtail step ins (they work the best) so they can be left in each pasture and we don't have to move them around too much. It takes two of us about 5 minutes each pasture to move them if we're not moving the back line and water and mineral, and about 15 minutes if we're moving the water and mineral with the back line. We move the back line every 3 days or so. Now we're moving them once a day in larger areas, and when the grass starts slowing down (and during the summer when we have more time) we'll switch to twice a day in small strips in the morning and evening. Right now they're squirting so the manure washes in with the rains, but as it firms up I'll sometimes drag the pasture to break it up so it will wash in and they'll graze everything during the drier months. We used to have chickens to do the job but we'd lose many of them to foxes, etc.. I'm working on some portable secure chicken tractor designs that when I get built we'll probably go back to using chickens to break up the manure. This managed grazing has improved our pastures tremendously and allowed a higher stocking rate per acre. It also helps a lot during drought conditions since the grass is not being stressed merely by traffic or overgrazing only the best grasses. As it recovers, it provides a moisture canopy so whatever rain or dew we have stays much longer. I'll never go back to just letting them out in the field again (unless I want to go on a extended vacation).
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Post by wanette on May 9, 2012 16:11:12 GMT -5
lakeport, thanks for the pics, I've just started IMG and have been trying to figure out an easier way of moving the fence than what I've been doing.
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Post by midhilldexters on May 9, 2012 20:51:40 GMT -5
Wanette glad you posted as I'd missed the pics , so that's why I hadn't responded! I use the same cheap electric reels Lakeport, also some without the stand that hang from a step in post. Thanks for the pic of the pvc pipe, I understand it now. You would certainly get a better pull using that type of end than using a step in post, great idea.
Carol K
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Post by lakeportfarms on May 10, 2012 4:45:53 GMT -5
Those reels are great! The local Lowes must be scratching their head wondering why one day they have 10 and the next day they have zero We have been using them for a couple of years now and they're still holding up, though they've turned from orange to yellow. I would probably suggest for those in warmer sunnier climates to use a plastic paint in a light color on them before you put them out to protect them from UV. But they have been fine here, and we have used them during the winter for a temporary holding area and they didn't get brittle during the cold. We made up the jumper with the gate handle to match the difference between the common height of the temporary fence and our top and lower hot fence on the permanent fence. The bungee and the give in the hot fence are usually fine to keep the gate handle in contact with the hot wire. Material Cost...About $.30 for the PVC, $.30 for the bungee (harbor freight), $2.00 for the gate handle, $8.00 for the reel, $almost free for the binder clips, plus the polywire and step ins. We move the water and mineral rather than making lanes back to the auto waterer, so we use a lot of hose, but they don't walk off all the benefits of the managed grazing. One of these days I'll have to take a video of them as I'm moving them, they see me coming toward them from several hundred feet away and they all start mooing. Yesterday when I was moving them I'm disconnecting the hot wire and I feel a nose nudging me from behind, I was our "clown" cow Rita saying "hurry up". Rita one summer had a habit of grabbing my shorts and pulling them down to my ankles. We had to warn visitors to tighten their belts or hold onto their waistbands. We have a waiting list for calves from Rita, even though she isn't registered.
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Post by dexterfarm on May 10, 2012 9:44:23 GMT -5
After reading this when it posted I got some of the reels. They work so much better than the ones that I have that are designed for fence use. the holes in the real allow you to put a plastic post or stick through it to keep it from unrolling and hold tension on it. I have also used just a bungee with nothing else to connect a hot wire to permanent fence.
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Post by lakeportfarms on May 16, 2012 7:18:52 GMT -5
Well, our grass has really exploded the past couple of weeks. I was wondering when it was going to happen, but then I think back to prior years and I'm usually only getting them out on pasture right now, so we're a couple of weeks ahead of normal. I've attached a few photos of the managed grazing using the setup I described earlier. You can really see the results. We thought we would only move them once per day, but we fell back in the the 2x per day move again in smaller strips. We're going to have some fat cows by the end of June! As you can see, the calves usually duck under the single wire and go to the next strip to nibble on the clover to stay out of the fray, which works well. We have about 500 old overly mature apple trees here, and we follow the cows grazing areas and trim them while the grass is still short. Though we'd love to do it in late winter, either the snow is too deep, the pasture is too wet, and we have WAY too many for just the two of us to make any dent in them, and we've been losing branches from the weight of the snow, and sometimes the weight of all the apples. I shudder to think the damage an ice storm would cause, and fortunately we haven't had one here for a number of years. After we fell the branches, we let them lay where the cows come and munch the leaves and ends of the fresh branches. They love them! The Highlands run in a different section of the property, which we're still working on improving the pasture.
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Post by wanette on May 16, 2012 17:04:23 GMT -5
lakeportfarms, thanks for the pics, love to see others farms and cattle. Just curious, how long before you are able to regraze those areas?
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