She's been burning it whenever the wind actually buggers offGet her to list the stuff on E-Bay, I'll take it off her hands
"Improving Our Lot" - Planned Holistic Grazing, for starters..
- Thread starter Kiwi Pete
- Start date
- Location
- Derbyshire
Oh dear HC, sorry to hear that. Crack on and get yerself well now, certainly don't want to be spending time in hospital at moment.Heart attack
Easter Saturday early morning. Home by Easter Monday evening thanks to our NHS.
Not bad thanks. I'm walking round the farm daily, driving machinery on the odd occasion it's needed and setting fences up using the trike. I'm told it could be over a year for full recovery though. Time to adopt Pete's approach to "work".
Shame your all that way down south, otherwise I'd be offering some help for you. Take care
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
It strikes me that many farmers around the world are actually scared of the stuff that grows out of their land.She's been burning it whenever the wind actually buggers off
I'm reasonably sure most of my neighbours hate their grass.
Sure, they might waste a bit of green stuff, but the brown stuff seems to really scare them..
..except for Andy, he has that much brown stuff that he feels the need to put lime on it at 2T/acre every year. He's scared of buying cattle, despite putting a $100,000 water scheme in,
I wonder, how do you help them?
There is logic to it. For years we've been told the less residue there is, the quicker the soil will warm up. That's not a bad thing here because the soil needs to warm up in order for anything to grow.
The problem is so many have taken the "too much residue can lead to delayed growth" and translated it to "Leave no residue!"
Areas around the acreage that have little to no residue definitely had noticeable grass first, however I wouldn't say the areas where I have lots of residue are really that far behind, if at all. I would bet money on the fact that there's better moisture for that grass with residue though. Maybe tomorrow before work I'll go out with a moisture metre and a ruler and see what I can see.
Or maybe not since it's supposed to be raining and snowing.
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
I took a few measurements yesterday as it was a nice day and didn't have much to do.
Here's one - on a grazed cell, I ran my little mob of sheep and cows around it about 8 times, and that warmed it up by .6°C in 20 minutes.
Soil here is "at field capacity" or slightly above field capacity, I tipped out a 150 litre portable trough and it took 93 seconds to disappear.
Soil temp under the electric fence (I didn't want my thermo broken by a stray hoof) went up the moment the mob went into the cell by .1°C and after 20 minutes it had gone up a further .6°C
We're in the 11°C range here at the moment, yes that's due to a very warm 3 weeks but biological activity instantly warms the soil - quorum sensing?
The biology seemed to wake up when I ran the mob around, perhaps anticipating more dung/urine
I also had my multimeter out, I clipped one lead to my soil probe (about a metre long) and pushed that in, put the other probe a couple of feet away and just pushed it in it's 2cm or so.
Again, only about .1V but when the mob moved, so did the current, by the 4th lap we were up to 190mV and by the 8th lap we were up to 360mV.
I think it's entirely possible that animal impact creates "springtime" every time it happens, as both the warming and the electrical current rise.
When the animals lay down, the current and temperature went down by half the amount - so I got them up and walked them around the cell once, and they were both 'up' again when I got back to the gadgets.
In short, the soil "knows" when it's going to get fed.
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
It sounds really crude, and I'm sorry to use this analogy - but if I shave off my pubic hair, it makes my wedding tackle "look bigger" than if it has "residue" hiding some of it.
I think that's why we can be fooled into the assumption that less residue = more grass is there now, it's a visible length-based assessment.
Then a measurer like a pasture-stick or platemeter confirms what the mind wants to believe, and no new soil is grown because the animals ate its food before it got a chance.
The thought of this happening, makes my willy smaller.
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
By farming better, other farmers notice what's over the hedge or " the best farm " in the district. Some may not like it that a different way maybe better but I'm sure over time they realise there's better ways of doing things even if they can't say it to you.
I have some photos like thatI think these photos sum up perfectly the hurdles people trying to implement regenerative methods often face.
I have no actual clue why she decided to rake up the residue. My only thought is it's where the burn barrels used to be so she's either started as raking up garbage or maybe she wants to put the barrels back there. Either way I'm not too concerned. With the size of that pile I doubt she's going to take the job out much farther
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For sh1!s and giggles I might ask her and see why she did it.
Made us laugh too
- Location
- Devon
Have I missed something? Can I ask who "she" is?She's been burning it whenever the wind actually buggers off
Is it the ground you farm?
- Location
- Glen Clova, Angus, DD8 4RD
Way off topic but:
In the last year I've felt healthier and fitter than ever before. I have congenital high cholesterol and a history of heart attacks in male family members. I've been offered Statins to reduce my risk since I was 30 but declined as I don't like needless medication. Perhaps I should have taken them. I certainly am now.
I now have to slowly build up my activity levels again to give my heart recovery time. I can still do most things for a short while but quickly get short of breath.
I do think a holistic view of life will help me adjust. We were aiming for a lifestyle similar tho Pete's anyway where moving a fence or 2 is most days work and the cows do our labouring. That's even more appropriate now.
I have no intentions of repeating the experience even though it was an anti-climax of a heart attack, all very calm and nowhere near as painful as I'd expected one to be.
Oh, and for any others of you in the risk group for it, I know a number of other men who've had heart attacks despite being slim, fit and active. It's not just fat people it happens to.
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I think a lot of why farmers don't like change is not because they don't want to do better or because they don't like change. It's because they have to admit that what they are doing isn't as good as they thought and that somehow makes them wrong. And they don't like being wrong. Same mentality as a farmer won't go to the doctor until they are nearly dead they don't like to admit there is something wrong.
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
Just fencing your migratory path around the property can take all day.... if you enjoy it enough!
The more simple you can make it, the more fun it gets too, because you get more time sat on your cush watching the coolies working for you ? you can break up their day with a quiet toddle around their paddock and speed up everyone's pumper.... or you can just do the 15 minutes and go home for the day and interrupt your busy farming mates day by calling them up
I am very pleased that you're taking it in your stride and under no illusions about being a hero. You gave me a hell of a fright, mate!
when I went in with a collapsed lung the triage nurse said they shouldn't bother with triage for farmers as they don't go to hospital till they are nearly dead, funny thing was I was debating if I should go as I didn't want to waste their time
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
You're missing being a part of the rural economic downturn, that's about it ?So we are told to feed ewes and lambs short lush leafy grass and never let it seed
and we are told to feed lambs creep which is crushed up seeds to aid rumen development
am I missing something
Yeah, I laugh every time I see a little lamb walking around "giraffe'ing" seedheads off cocksfoot plants that have gone to seed, they obviously know nothing about how to grow big and strong (for CLAAS KGaA mbH and Brent oil)
- Location
- somerset
we have become 'conditioned' over the years, to think we are tied to our farms, the reality is, our farms are tied to us. Animals have to be looked after, everyday, so no matter how bad we feel, out we go, a macho thing, that is not doing us any favours, health wise at all. Brought home to me, after struggling on for a couple of days, because that is what we do, never went back for 3 months, inc 4 weeks in hospital, but the farm, carried on, everything got done, except the one logical thing, pride, and 'not wanting to be seen as failed', stopped me selling the cows, they went in the end, but, financially, health and stress, they should have gone earlier !
But that is a common fault in farming, we think the farm, would collapse, without us, it won't, it will carry on,. Change will happen, it's natural, and usually for the good, I can imagine what some farmers said, when tractors first appeared. But farmers, are naturally cautious, change is 'different', so, a wait and see policy, is usually the 'safest' way, and as a general rule, the older we are, the more cautious we are, all very good, except the av age of farmers is about 59, so change is very slow !! The thing to do now, with massive changes coming, is let the younger generation, get on, and have a go, they can cope with change, a lot better, than us.
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
You gave me a fright too, and I haven't even met you.
I think some people see "getting help" as unnecessary, sometimes, as in they've "been right without the Dr for the last 63 years and I'll be right today!" and so they deny the possibility that they mightn't be right at all.
You see a lot of that with mental health, too; my wife suffers from Bipolar (we all suffer sometimes, it's a bugger of a thing like that, contagious) and yet her instinct/response is still to turn down any help offered.
I cracked 6 bones in my ankle and hobbled around on it for 7 weeks saying "it's only a sprain" simply because I wanted to keep racing my bike til the end of the Southern Series
we are crazy creatures