Rotational Grazing?

[hamonsdexter]

Just wanted to start a thread about Rotational Grazing.
1. How many Acres do you graze?
2. How many cattle are in your Herd?
3. Number of Paddocks in your rotation?
4. Number of days in each paddock?
5. How do you handle the Daily water Requirement of the cattle.
6. Make up of Pasture such as what type of plant material and soil type.

[Maple View Farm]

This is the best topic and one of my favorites!!
Sorry I'm going to screw up all your numbers.
10 acres give or take
9 rotations, going to break them down even smaller this year. If they are too big, that gives the cows too many choices on what to eat so they skip over alot of the forage. Smaller is better and they will then eat what is in front of them. Once done making more divisions, there will be 15 rotations.

Once they eat the rotation down to 5-6 inches, move them to the next. Depending on the height of the rotation when you put them in, It could take a day or it could take a week to eat it down.

We carefully have them mapped out so there is a walk way sacrifice area leading back to the barn where there is shelter and water and minerals.

We have anywhere between 12-18 depending on the season. A local guy has 40 head in 30x40 size rotations, maybe even smaller. He moves them everyday and has to use a pickup with a water tank in the bed to water them everyday. He has a crazy fast finish rate. I can call him if anyone is interested. Sells his meat at farmers markets.

Neither this local guy nor us really tilled up and planted. We re seeded in patches. the rotational grazing inproves the health of the soil in turn bringing back wonderful forage plants. In our field we had red clover re establish. We have bee hive up against the pastures to polinate the clover and alfalfa ect... I stem the health of the pasture to the bees too. We have our dairy goats go out with the cows. They eat alot of the broad leaf plants down that the cows wont eat. So try a few goats to improve the forage.

spread manure on the rotations. Brush hog the extra groth down to add green manure to the pastures.

Like I said I love this topic. I'll stop for now . LOL!!

[Cascade Meadows Farm - Kirk]

Great Topic!

1. How many Acres do you graze?

We have 40 acres including about 15 acres of woods. We primarily graze about 25 acres of pasture, but let the cows graze the woods sometimes.

2. How many cattle are in your Herd?

25 - 40 Dexters + 20 - 50 grazing icelandic sheep + 20 - 50 grazing american guinea hogs (graze just like cows). Multi-species grazing works great.

3. Number of Paddocks in your rotation?

We have 7 big paddocks, but we strip-graze within those paddocks using an easily moved electric polywire and step-in fiberglass posts, so we actually have hundreds of small "paddocs" in effect.

4. Number of days in each paddock?

Animals are moved twice per day during grazing season. Each morning and each evening, we easily shift the electric string forward to give them a fresh strip of forage that's 1/2 day worth of grazing. It's like a salad bar. They are always grazing VERY fresh grass with NO parasites. We use ZERO worming medication and our cows are very healthy and VERY THICK.

5. How do you handle the Daily water Requirement of the cattle

We have a little seasonal stream that runs through the middle of our place 8 months of the year, so especially in winter, they drink from the stream.

During the grazing season, we use smallish (100-200 gallon), easily dumped and easily dragged rubber tanks, fed by 3/4 inch black poly tubing above ground. It's the stuff used for underground sprinkling systems and you can get it for about $20 per hundred feet. The poly-pipe comes in 100 ft lengths. We just drag it around and connect it with little plug-in connectors. We are blessed with a year-round spring at the top of our property so we can run gravity fed water to most any spot on our 40 acre place. We just let water constantly trickle into the tanks, and overflow, keeping the water very fresh.

6. Make up of Pasture such as what type of plant material and soil type.

Our #1 most important plant is white clover (two varieties, Durana and Patriot). They make their own nitrogen fertilizer from the air (special bacteria help them do it). With the clover, we don't need to use nitrogen fertilizer. We like to have 60% clover or even more. We've NEVER had a case of bloat (although, I'd likely cull an animal if it was prone to bloat, so it wouldn't pass that problem on to future generations).

The rest is mostly orchard grass and a mix of whatever has been here for decades (bluegrass, fescue, other). We used to have TONS of certain kinds of weeds, but the cows and especially sheep have cleaned them out.

Soil is loam. We need to lime our pastures from time to time because all the winter rain we get in the northwest washes out the calcium and makes the soil too acid. One thing to keep in mind is that farming is like soil-mining. The plants and animals rob the soil of minerals so you've got to replace those minerals from time to time. When an animal leaves our farm we say goodbye to copper and zinc and calcium and phosphorus and magnesium and boron and many other minerals. You have to replace those minerals sooner or later or your farm will die. We test our soil from time to time.

[lakeportfarms]

Here's a link to a number of posts from about a year ago that sort of morphed into a rotational grazing thread. Perhaps Olga can move some of the individual posts and combine it with this thread.

dextercattle.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=2232&page=1

[dexterfarm]

Our farm is in 2 locations. I will speak only about the location that is at our house. The large farm is still a work in progress with fencing.

1. How many Acres do you graze?3 rotational grazed + small sacrifice paddock and barn
2. How many cattle are in your Herd? As many as 10 on this 3 acres including calves.
3. Number of Paddocks in your rotation?11
4. Number of days in each paddock?usually 3 days
5. How do you handle the Daily water Requirement of the cattle.
We have a 300 gallon tank on a trailer moved with a 4 wheeler. We use 18 gallon plastic tubs from home depot with an automatic waterer clamped on the side that is fed from the main tank.
6. Make up of Pasture such as what type of plant material and soil type.
we have not planted anything but in some bare areas we planted native grasses and forbs. we try to encourage these native plants to grow. Other than that the make up is primarily orchard, brome, read canary, and purple clover.
I do not like the white dutch clover for our climate. It does not get deep enough roots here. It gets short dense roots in the spring and grows well crowding out other vegetation. the cows eat it first down to nothing and it does not recover well. In late summer the top growth is almost nonexistent because the roots dont go deep enough to get moisture. I would just as soon the cows would eat it down enough to kill it but it always comes back with spring rains.

[Dahdo]

I am in the process of adding some cross fencing and an alley that will make managed intensive grazing MUCH easier this year. The sketch below shows how things will look when I am done. Basically, the new alley will give access to 6.5 acres and 12 paddocks that will be set up using single strand of polywire. Those paddocks can be strip grazed when the grass is growing fast, making effectively many more paddocks. All 12 have access to the heavy use/barn area where there is water and shelter. There are two more paddocks along our panhandle that have access to a small year round stream. There is also a pond area where I am trying to reestablish some good grass.

This will be the first year with this setup, but I plan to hay some of these paddocks and will only graze them lightly in spring, then again after regrowth in August and September. We are fortunate to have a shallow water table that provides sub irrigation in the summer. I'll be using to keep the period between grazing to 5-6 weeks in order to get the benefit of reduced parasite load.

Our land was basically a hay field for about 25 years before we bought it 4 years ago. Two years of grazing is already starting to show results...the fescue dominated stand is now starting to give way to some Timothy and big trefoil. I tried to establish some white clover last year but I don't think I had the right variety. I may try the Durana that Kirk uses, but we have such wet soils that I may have to stick with birdsfoot trefoil seeing how well the big trefoil is doing.

Ideas and suggestions are welcome on this scheme!

[Dahdo]

Here is the sketch...

Attachments:

[tonhou]

In NZ all grass systems (which is most) rule of thumb rotation times are:
Spring 14-21 days
Summer/Autumn 30-35 days
Winter 60-75 days with hay/silage
It doesn't really matter how large the area is or how many animals.

I realise that North American management systems may not fit this if there are severe winters.

--Tony

[Maple View Farm]

Wow that look similar to ours. Our walk way sacrifice goes straight from the barn past 2 rotations, then makes a 90 degree turn to cross in front of the entrances of the rest of the rotations. No matter where they are, they can come in out of the weather and get to the water and minerals.

[jlmissouri]

I Don't intend to hijack the thread, but I am curious why so many people rotate their pasture everyday?

I am using electric fence to make paddocks inside my 20 acres. I move my cattle about every week or whenever the grass has been grazed enough. Does anyone else do these slower rotations? The grass seems to be very evenly grazed and it springs back quick. Seems like the everyday to a new paddock is a lot of work, what is to be gained besides a cleaner pasture for awhile.

I have 9 head of cattle, one pregnant cow a steer and 7 heifers and my paddocks are usually whatever a 1/4 mile of wire will enclose.

[lakeportfarms]

Once a week is better than not at all, but the benefits to moving once (or in our case 2, sometimes 3 times/day) is that the cows will generally tend to graze the newest longest grass only, rather than going back to the older areas they had been on earlier in the day or days before. We don't move them exclusively to fresh grass, they still have the area they grazed that they trample and loaf on for a couple of days, but the process of trampling and loafing helps increase the organic matter in the soil, and allows the grass to recover more quickly. Most important, we're building soil reserves for the future by doing it this way. You'll see marked improvement in your pastures immediately, but more so two/three years down the road.

This also allows the maximum amount of rest for the areas they grazed which allows the forage to attain it's maximum potential.

At 9 head on 20 acres with some rotation you're doing ok, but how would you like to put 18 head on the 20 acres and still feed less hay than you presently use? Or would you like to feed little to no hay for 11 months rather than the amount that you do now? We're trading a little of our time moving the herd in the pastures for dollars either in sales or in the amount of hay we'd have to purchase.

The other benefit with frequent moves is in the demeanor of the herd. They are used to human contact and intervention, even if we're not handling them, they associate us with something they like; fresh food! They'll FOLLOW us wherever we go. We don't push them, we lead them. And then there is the benefit of just looking at them more frequently which lets you more quickly identify any health issues, calving/breeding or otherwise.

[jlmissouri]

Thanks for your response lakeportfarms.

So it seems the main reason for moving daily is better feed efficiency. I wonder how much better than moving once a week though?

My goal is 20 head, 21 with my bull, I am just building my herd currently. My cattle are hand tame, and will follow me anywhere. When I set up a new paddock I just prop the fence up with a piece of PVC and call my cows, they come running. I check them daily so they know me well.

[lakeportfarms]

Grass begins to grow again at about 3 days. So if you leave the cattle on that area past that point you're delaying the regrowth due to the foot traffic and possible re-grazing. When we do the twice per day moves, the back line is moved up every 2 days or so, 3 at the most. Moving them daily satisfies their desire to eat the newest grass, and so they are not interested in the areas they've already been, even if it's tasty and unspoiled. This preserves the root structure so it is more drought resistant. The sooner the grass starts it's regrowth the more you get deeper roots and a moisture canopy to slow the evaporation. We've also found that they loaf and manure the previously grazed grass when they're not feeding, so they're not spoiling areas in the grass they haven't yet consumed.

Our temporary fence is quick to set up, and we usually set up 4-5 days worth of moves at a time, so the daily effort is not very time consuming at all. The smaller calves will duck the wire and enjoy grazing the clover and tastiest forage, and like to lie down in the knee high grass out of sight (and out from under foot) of the larger ones who are too tall to avoid having the wire brush their backs if they duck it.

You've already experienced the behavior change of the cows with your moves, so you can see the benefits there. The only drawback to the daily moves is that if the herd gets sight of you, they start making a racket thinking you're going to come out and roll up wire :-) They'll walk over to the reel end and stand there waiting for you and be prepared for some glares if you don't!

[Deleted]

We thought rotational was the way to do things 'right' but it turns out that for us - it wont work after having an Environment Impact done.
It included soil and native grass identification throughout the property.

Our 'issue' is seasonal native grasses. Depending on the time of year and the weather, depends solely on which grasses will be in growth and which will have slowed to no growth.

We are fortunate enough to have 8 of the top 15 Australian Native grasses required for year round grazing with others providing roughage and some nutrients and minerals - just not as much as the chosen 8.


1. How many Acres do you graze?
100 acres

2. How many cattle are in your Herd?
20.5 Dexters [5 x maturing bulls - 5 young heifers - 2 resting mummas this year - 7 pregnant - and one mum due this week]

3. Number of Paddocks in your rotation?
We have 2 paddocks - dividing the property in half.

4. Number of days in each paddock?
0

5. How do you handle the Daily water Requirement of the cattle.
We have 4 large dams and a seasonal no-named creek running through.

6. Make up of Pasture such as what type of plant material and soil type.
Australian Native grasses which have grown naturally on a sandy loam soil.
The only over seeding we have done was with 4 types of Wallaby, Red and wheat grasses near three of the dams after deepening them so hence needed to bring back the grasses to the edge as quickly as possible.

[littlecowfl]

1. How many Acres do you graze?

35

2. How many cattle are in your Herd?

8-10

3. Number of Paddocks in your rotation?

6

4. Number of days in each paddock?

30+

5. How do you handle the Daily water Requirement of the cattle.

Water troughs in each pasture.

6. Make up of Pasture such as what type of plant material and soil type?

Bahia and bermuda grass. Sandy soil.