Multi-Species Rotational Grazing | “Should I Mow Behind Animals in the Rotation?”
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- Опубликовано: 4 окт 2024
- Join me today as we do a cattle and sheep move, look over the paddocks, and talk about whether or not we should mow behind the animals as they rotate through the paddocks.
I mowed behind my paddocks last year here in Washington and regretted it… especially going into August. Trying out letting my pastures be “imperfectly mowed” by my cattle this year 😊 so far, loving it! 👏🏻
Awesome…nothing like experiencing it firsthand! Your soil will love you for staying cooler in August.🌱
Without atleast a side by side comparison, it's impossible to say what would have happened.
@@richardbruton5980…that’s the point of the video here - I have pasture ground that’s rented and selectively grazed and my paddocks are non-selectively grazed or at least more so than the rented ground. I have the comparison and I see it every year. You have to mow selectively grazed ground if avoiding pasture degradation.
Especially when starting to improve new land, you're more likely to have woody or at least stiff plants the animals don't love. Given a choice between mowing and rolling, I'd usually choose rolling. Stiff plants get broken while vegetative plants spring back (over the stiff plants)
Never thought about rolling as an option. Great point!
This is exactly what we are trying to figure out
I agree with what you said about redefining beauty. I love the diversity in my "unkept" yard. I love how healthy it looks. I love that I can see all sorts of flowers, plants, insects, deer, moose, sheep, even bears in my front yard because it is so healthy. I'd love for all the pastures to look like that.
I'd take it a step further though. I love watching all things farm related (one of the reasons I watch your channel haha). I always say I could watch combines working all day, every day. I love it. It's so calming and satisfying.
Yeah that’s awesome. I can’t imagine a bear in my yard tho!🤣
@birchfieldfarming lol it happens every year here
Keep sharing the good word Brother
Thanks Mike!
Awesome job! I love all the commentary. I couldn't agree more.
Thanks for watching!🌱
Praise God! First time seeing any video from you, clicked into the timeline and the first thing I heard were the words of our Lord Jesus! Love to hear it. We are in CT and rotationally graze Katahdin sheep, hoping to add Dexter cattle at some point. God Bless and thanks for the information!
God bless you as well! These small farms full of faith will be crucial in the times just up ahead. Be well, friend.
#eastgatetentrevival
I've been wondering the same thing here in Kentucky. We don't have enough livestock right now, and the fields have a heavy amount of weeds. I'm considering mowing behind our sheep flock. Hopefully, I won't have to consider that in the coming years once our numbers grow and the soil improves.
Mowing definitely has its place in pasture maintenance with low stock density. Always satisfying too see it improve each year though, and it sounds like that’s the direction you’re headed. Sheep are awesome!🤠
@birchfieldfarming we bought 22 acres a couple of years ago. The fields were in rough shape. There had been no animals on it in around 20 years or more. Each year, we've seen improvements in the soil/grasses with rotationally grazing all of our livestock, including laying hens. The sheep are such incredible animals. They are quickly becoming my favorite. Low maintenance.
@@barryhughes8963Man, great to hear others having success at this!!🤠
Thanks for the content and all that you do.
You got it!
I'm considering that very question as I look at my hay.
There’s such an art to all of it, hay included.
Beautiful farm and livestock,nice job !
We are lush and fast growing until we are not. With a daily move this time of year 30 days after a move and you would never known it was grazed.
We can get very dry in July, August. Anything left standing is good enough to eat in the winter as hay, so it can be good enough for them to eat when they come back to that bay.
Also, it's seeds that i want to be there, and it can help cover the soil. By leaving it grow, we are also building roots.
If you want, you can measure brix readings, if its low, you can feed the pasture, but when its good, then you know when to move them when its at optimal for gains
Great thoughts here, thanks for sharing. One question: I’ve heard some of the newer research stating brix levels are actually highest in the older, taller forage. Has this been your experience as well? Thank you for your encouragement!
@birchfieldfarming I don't know, bought a refractometer last year for the row crops. But later this summer, I would like to use it on the pasture as a plant health tool.
In the old days of dairy half, the people said cut early morning and the other half said cut in the late afternoon. Both were claiming high brix.
There is something to the old hay. From a nutrient on paper standpoint, we have some horse hay that should be bedding. But them cows love it and do good on it.
Thanks for giving God His due credit. Intelligent design.
It’s a marvelous creation🌱
Working on getting to the same level!!! Nice work!
Thanks for stopping by🌱
Children at a smorgasboard without supervision is selective grazing. Parents dishing out meat, veggies in a particular portion, before dessert is offered is non selective grazing.
Good analogy…I’m wondering lately what a triple species (cattle, sheep, chicken) mob graze impact might look like on some of my less productive areas.
Man you need Playlist
I am a RUclips greenhorn
I was going to bed. 😂 Thanks for the video
🤣🤣As always, thanks for watching, buddy!🤠
Hi Jason, when those bulls are agitated they sound a little like a roaring Lion.
Even though this very wet Spring season has been challenging to farmers that grow crops it looks like it was a big plus to your Grass Fed Cow and Sheep herds.
Yeah, I’ve been telling the family, “What a GREAT year to be a grass farmer!” Hope ur doing well, Ben.
I have cut down the paddock size in order to mob graze a little harder
And how is it working out?
have you thought about mowing behind and over seeding something like pumpkins beans and sunflowers? If you got a lil over production and rain. 50 bucks of seed might be worth it to see if you can roll the dice on it. if you time it right. You can put some nice wax paper under the pumpkins see if you can collect them later. And use that pasture for stocking and regrowth.
Neat idea on the pumpkins! Yeah, we do Green Cover’s warm season cover crop grazing mix, usually in at least one of the paddocks each year. Again, the blessing of running multi-species with a higher stock density is no mowing or degradation of naturally occurring perennial pasture.
@@birchfieldfarming truth. It's to bad you don't have any pigs. It always feels like a feeder run of pigs is a good payoff. But trouble at the same time. But the good thing about pigs is a lot of seeds run right through them better than almost any other creature on the farm
@@MistressOP I ran #’s on hogs when we first started, and it would cost me more in feed to raise them than just buying the meat! I will say, though, I am still intrigued by why the old timers used to call them “mortgage lifters.” I really think it was b/c everyone had a family milk cow and fed the leftovers or “slop” to the hogs and raise them out like that. Milk fed pork is hopefully something I get to experiment with at some point. In the meantime, there’s just no better deal than grass.
@@birchfieldfarming ya true there's a golden number. Kinda hard to do.
You also can adjust and or mowing depending what you want. One guy mows in front of his chickens because they don't like the long grass. But you adjust when you put the chickens in.
Greg Judy emphasis is also make your owner of a lease land happy. Make sure it is looking better. He does spend a lot of time improving the land, getting rid of cedar, of others, etc.
After i first started learning about this I think Joel Salatin did go over Scriptural reference to the animals, birds, and plants, and it was important because Israel was Agricultural. And they did depend on it much more than we do. My wife was mentioning that old village farmers knew a lot of this in Hungary, by years and generations of experience. That was before the rollout of tractors etc.
I think often about how different a conversation would be between myself now and my grandparents, who had all the traditional skills to thrive on the land. We’ve lost so much as a culture over just a few generations.
Allen Williams, PhD in genetics, grew up in an old-fashioned multi-species farm. He was taught in university the modern methods. Then he discovered regenerative ag, that his grandparents did it right.
Great pep talk! Thoughts that came to mind...Gain per acre is what will drive profitability, correct? Making smaller paddocks with more frequent moves. "Mobbing, mowing, moving" or factor in fuel, machinery maintainence and rental or purchase. Herds that are moved in tight mobs will eat more variety and more aggressively, just have to move frequently. Mimic the pre-industrial mob.
@@Marilou-g5tThe simplicity is one of the things that draws me.
@@Marilou-g5tI think you’re right, generally speaking. My whole learning curve has been relearning overgrazing is a function of time and not how many animals, so I think the timing of those moves is always the key.
Good stuff Jason. One suggestion I received from another channel is that because my cattle herd size is so small and because my paddock sizes are so small, whatever the cows don’t eat (undesirables), another option is go knock them down after a move with a weed trimmer to in essence “level the playing field” to help assist the desirables with pushing out the undesirables. Because I’m just getting started with rotating cattle in this fashion and the grazable land on my ranch isn’t quite used to this type of management style, the % of undesirables I’m seeing still seems quite high. Eventually I’m hoping this % changes with this style of management practice.
Yeah for sure you could do that. I do think you’ll see improvement over time - so many challenges when just starting out!
@@birchfieldfarming So many challenges for sure. As we're entering the summer months, I do have to make sure these cows have access to shade so lots of work this past weekend in the brush with a chainsaw. By the way, what do you do when you have to go outta town for a few days or go on vacation? Do you have someone that you can rely on to move your animals?
@@bonsukanYes! We have good friends (invaluable!) who watch the farm. People who have some sense about them. So thankful for them!
I would say yes....
🤠👍🌱
23:39 Dr Joel Wallach talks about the importance of minerals definitely recomend watching his youtube video. (Dead doctors don't lie.) 1995 Its free on youtube about 2hrs and 20mins. Would love to hear your thoughts on it, super interesting and full of ah ha moments. Keep up the good work Jason, i aspire to be living the homestead dream and every time i see a video of yours it motivates me. God bless brother in Christ.
Thank you, God bless you and yours.
ruclips.net/video/0JfPPljmPHw/видео.htmlsi=g8izhC3dnrdu-159
I have a question from the last few videos. Do you have the cows just for the diversity? Income/ pasture impact? Why don't you just focus on the birds and sheep if they make more money over time? Just curious to hear your reasoning. Thanks, I really enjoy you videos
Well, the pasture diversity is good, but honestly we just love to eat good beef, and the kids and I have really enjoyed the homestead milking we’ve done. If it was entirely a financial decision, then it’s sheep for sure. The Devons do have a place here, but I lean heavier towards the sheep side.
Great message by chance what are you using software-wise for editing your videos? Splicing in that chart while maintaining your video sound plus splicing in the drone footage is awesome. Really really good job all around.
Hey thanks! Just a very standard, simple iMovie on iPhone…nothing fancy, no training.
Oh wow no kidding I got to learn how to use the darn thing lol. Thanks for responding
Greg Judy has a few good ideas too
Ol’ Greg has done wonders for the direct sell hair sheep market
Should you mow the fresh patties too?
Sure makes a mess. If you can let them be for a few days, chickens are a great solution to run behind cattle. Also, staying away from chemical de-workers will allow your dung beetle population to thrive. All kinds of options.
Just tried to do a head count, are you down one bull ? Your hay fields look great.
Man, ur sharp!!🧐Pulled the horn bull - that heifer should cycle here again May 30 if not bred…I’m not willing to chance it. Hopefully she’s bred tho!
@@birchfieldfarming lol. Bet she is.
Gradually tighten the mob, but move as the paddock is mowed, to minimize escape, overgraze, loss of animal performance,...
About 50K lbs/acre live weight animal seems to be doing it for us.
Do you plant seed after they move to a new paddock?
We have done some successful warm season cover cropping in the past. The animals loved the sorghum!
How large are each of your paddocks?
1/4 acre paddocks, we’re running about 14 right now. I have some additional ground that’s not in paddocks where I run them afterwards, so about 5 acres total.
@@birchfieldfarming Thanks! Great to know, thanks for sharing 😊
@@beckyforbis4858You got it!🤠