LETHBRIDGE – Think of every patch of bare soil in a pasture as a pound of beef unavailable for sale, says grazing consultant Jim Gerrish.
The best way to make meat, milk and fibre is to capture solar energy and water to grow forage, said Gerrish, who runs American Grazing Lands Services in Idaho.
The solar panel is the land.
“We like to say solar energy is free, but you have to have that collector, the land,” he said at a grazing conference in Lethbridge Nov. 29.
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Young growing plants absorb more energy than mature plants. Livestock prefer green growing leaves for the best nutrition and palatability.
The grazer needs to estimate the leaf area index, which is the ratio of leaf area to ground area. A good mix of legumes, grasses and forbes captures more energy.
Most legumes have horizontal leaves, grasses are upright and forbes are both. The layering of these plants provides a good solar panel. In natural plant communities, there is a wide variety of plant structures.
Almost every pasture has a variety of conditions where there is bare ground, overgrazed areas and spots the animals ignored. This is caused by unrestricted grazing where the animals had too much choice.
Repeatedly grazing a plant to a short height produces short roots. If more than half the plant is gone, root growth is affected.
“When you take excessive amounts of leaf, you are really knocking the roots off,” he said.
However, among many livestock producers, there is a fear of wasting grass so animals are often left on a pasture too long with long-term consequences of poor range health.
It takes experience to know when to move cattle onto pasture, especially in spring.
Spring grazing management gets cows off hay as soon as possible because it is expensive. Early grazing keeps grasses from heading out, which can take the cattle into summer and fall with more nutritious leafy growth on the pasture.
“Get out early and move fast. But you can get out too early and be out of grass in three weeks. It is a learned skill,” Gerrish said.
Many producers across the northern states and Canadian Prairies are feeding hay for 130 days without knowing how much it costs.
“It is just a bad habit. If they knew how much it cost them to feed hay for 130 days, they would start making some changes,” he said.
Extending a grazing season into winter cuts the demand for hay, but it takes planning.
“Planning for winter grazing starts before the first blade of grass turns green in the spring,” he said.
What does it take to extend the winter grazing season?
Forage in the field is needed either from native range like rough fescue or some other stockpiled perennial pasture. Any kind of forage can be stockpiled but some grasses work better than others.
Tall fescue has its highest nutrient value in the fall and winter, whereas crested wheatgrass will require protein supplementation by feeding several pounds of hay or providing lick tanks.
To make these concepts work, the level of soil nutrients must be good.
“When you buy an acre of land, you buy the nutrients in that soil,” he said.
Further, it is a good idea to use animals and breed combinations well suited to grazing. Many cattle types have been developed for rapid gain in the feedlot whereas others do better on a grass regime. When harvesting grass, think whether pregnant cows, yearlings or pairs are turned out and how they will manage.
“You need the right animal to be the factory,” Gerrish said.
