Woods browse value.

[Gorignak]

The drought has capped a 20 year change in the local climate here in NW Arkansas. I have logged for the 38 years we have been here, and that has offered a 150-200 year window into past climate norms. We are in a tailspin here.

I have managed a 160 acre "tree farm" for 38 years. It has been "whistling past the graveyard" for me for 15 years. The 60 acres of prime, North slope benches will continue to produce good growth. The flat 100 acres on the top of the mountain will not sustain hardwoods anymore. I have converted some into scattered pines, but they are not growing well enough to justify the intense management necessary to establish a continuous stand of them.

So, I have given in to the local pattern of land management and logged the first 40 aces of the 100 heavily. We cut all above 10". That leaves about a 50/50 tree to open ratio. The trees are slim and tall, so there will be no crown shading initially. I plan to continue to remove the standing trees down to scattered trios of post oaks, black gums, and white oaks. It will end up approx 85% pasture and 15 % coverage with trees. We are building an 8 wire, 52", hi-tensile fence around the first 40 acres. It will be goat, pig, and cattle tight. We hope it is bear, coyote, and mountain lion deterrent. Our 3 Pyrenees are doing a great job so far.

Goats are the local solution to the immense surge in brush that we will have. I will broadcast seed Fescue and Bluestem. I have done clover in the past, but until I can lime the soil, it is a hopeless effort. It will be 10 years before the stumps bump out easily with our dozer...BUT, we have the thin layer of topsoil and leaf litter intact. It is the only sane way to proceed. Bulldozed clearing of land here leaves a near sterile surface. This 100 acres is flat enough to land a plane on....and it is difficult to find a rock on the surface !!! It makes a nice pastoral setting with the scattered timber

Does anybody have any experience with Dexters utilizing the browse the first few years before the patches of grass are established. Obviously, goats will be in heaven. But I am wondering how many yearling cattle the 40 acres would support, or how much supplementation I would need to supply to keep them in good condition. The understory vegetation/browse will be thick beyond imagination for a couple of years. If Arkansas can grow one thing, it is sprouts from stumps

Thanks......Mike

[lakeportfarms]

We had a similar experience. Our old abandoned apple orchard had gone over 20 years without any care. When we purchased the property I couldn't walk through it due to all the multi-flora roses, blackberry plants, and any other number or noxious weeds. The trees were still in decent shape, but terribly overgrown. We knew we needed to get to them and trim them as soon as we could so we didn't lose any more than we already had due to heavy snow on the branches. Unfortunately we did get a late season snow the first year that split a number of the trees, but the majority have now been trimmed back out of the danger zone. Our solution was a mixture of goats and the cows. We have a herd of both Dexters and Scottish Highlands that transformed it over about 4 years. Because they ate and beat down the brush, we were able to get to the trees to trim them and drag out the rose and grape vines that had taken over many of the trees. The cows love the apple leaves (and apples) and when they started munching on the branches and leaves of the apple trees, we noticed a real change in their appearance and even their hooves. I'll find some photos of the orchard as it was when we purchased it along with what it looks like today.

The goats ultimately were sold off because they stripped the bark of the trees and we couldn't keep them in. That was a happy day...

[indexters]

Just started with Dexters this year. Re-fenced an old pasture/woodland area that my grandpa used to run Herefords on. Had grown up with saplings, blackberries, thorns, vines along the treeline and to a lesser degree in the understory. Turned three dexters loose in May and now in August it is looking completely different. They really did a job on the brush. Originally we had planned to barrow a couple of my mom's goats, but that proved unnecessary. The pasture needs improved so we are supplementing this year. Plus with our drought, we keep a round bale out in the pasture. But I still see them munching away at low leaves and weeds. They have even stripped my very small bamboo grove.

[copperhead]

This is our second year of cutting elm trees for the cattle and goats to eat, to supplement something green. the cows run to it, they usually beat the goats out of it

[bruff64]

I just opened up an old pasture that was overgrown with multiflora rose and briars. The Dexters have destroyed the roses, consuming all the leaves on the stems from the ground up. I have seen cattle nibble the new growth, but never have I seen roses with bare green stems.

[Gorignak]

I was attracted to Dexters by descriptions of their utilization of browse and marginal pasture. These experiences hold promise that this is true.

Copperhead...."Poor folks have poor ways"....and, don't we all know it !!!! Arkansas is buzzing with the sound of chainsaws as all my neighbors are working the margins of their pasture and "cuttin' brush". Hey, you feel a little better because the fence lines always need some work.

indexters/Gene...I read an agri report some years ago about the vast stands of "bamboo"....called river cane around here, when much of the Nation was first settled The report said that it was the highest yielding grass in the US.....more forage, of higher quality than any other ground cover. But, like in our discussion of bluestem, it is very, very sensitive to overgrazing pressure, and rapidly dies out when mismanaged.

bruff64.....I still have scars from my youth...trapping and hunting in Maryland's multiflora rose wildernesses. We loved really small beagles that would fearlessly go in and run out the game.....impressive if Dexters will eat them.

I'm really pumped about the volume of brush I am going to have available. The 40 acres will probably support all our efforts, even if this insane dry period finishes with a third or fourth year. I have a second 40 that will be fenced the following year. I'll be in a rocking chair before all the stumps are gone, but the kids will have a good start.

Mike

[cddexter]

if you don't mind a slightly warped sense of humor...there's that old saw about people who buy jerseys because they can't afford a goat....this thread is starting to sound like that, only with dexters. Here in the pacific northwest we have huge maple trees with giant leaves, often more than a foot across. Cows love'm. Maybe because there is so much pasture, my girls don't bother much with the blackberries, which is a shame, as here we have the big leaved himalayan blackberry, which shoots canes 30 feet in a season, and the end turns into a growing tip, roots, and then arches another 30 feet next year. Really invasive. The sheep like them, but can't keep up with them. I guess nothing's perfect. c.

[bruff64]

I opened a new section of pasture last week and already the roses are screaming for relief. I just can't believe how well these Dexters strip Multiflora Rose. Soon it will be green stems of grass and just green rose stems

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