Holistic grazing stocking density, advice needed

[eastdevonhobbyist]

Hi,

I'm just doing a feasibility study into running a holistic planned grazing sheep/goat/beef/dairy operation. I'm having trouble finding recommended or example stocking densities for south west UK farms using this system. Does anyone have experience with holistic planned grazing that could offer some advice on this or point me in the right direction? I'm also interested in recovery times for grass.

[EDIT]

I have enough land that if I divide it evenly into 32 paddocks, each of which will be grazed for one day in a cycle (giving the grass a 32 day recovery time) then the size of each paddock is 20m x 20m or 0.04ha. According to this 0.04ha holds about 160kg of dry matter (DM). From the same source a 60kg sheep requires about 1.8kg of DM per day. Bringing these together I can supposedly stock 89 sheep in my 20x20m paddock. That sounds very high, would they even fit in!? Does this seem about right or have my calculations gone wrong somewhere?

Thanks for any help!

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Hi, about as far from you as can be without swimming; we've been using HPG for a year or two, swards aren't really where we're wanting them to be yet but we're comfortably running around 110,000kgLWT/ha on the lighter cover, doubling it on the better cover with more shifts.
We're upgrading our water system and fencing this year and then we'll look to maintain higher SD with less effort.
We'll run our beef calf mob around 220,000kg/ha over winter on a covercrop.

We use about half our animal units sheep and half calves/cattle - ie about 370 sheep and 90 head of cattle on for winter.
Flexibility is pretty crucial so we use 90% grazing stock 10% owned stock.

 

[eastdevonhobbyist]

Hi, about as far from you as can be without swimming; we've been using HPG for a year or two, swards aren't really where we're wanting them to be yet but we're comfortably running around 110,000kgLWT/ha on the lighter cover, doubling it on the better cover with more shifts.
We're upgrading our water system and fencing this year and then we'll look to maintain higher SD with less effort.
We'll run our beef calf mob around 220,000kg/ha over winter on a covercrop.

We use about half our animal units sheep and half calves/cattle - ie about 370 sheep and 90 head of cattle on for winter.
Flexibility is pretty crucial so we use 90% grazing stock 10% owned stock.

Hey Pete, thanks for your advice. That's in the same ballpark as the number I quoted above, which is encouraging. So when you say grazing stock you mean you borrow livestock? Do the owners pay you for that? How did you go about finding people for that and how do you determine a price for the service?

Why do you stock denser in the winter? Do you supplement feed in the winter? Do your livestock have shelter?

 

[Guleesh]

Hi,

I'm just doing a feasibility study into running a holistic planned grazing sheep/goat/beef/dairy operation. I'm having trouble finding recommended or example stocking densities for south west UK farms using this system. Does anyone have experience with holistic planned grazing that could offer some advice on this or point me in the right direction? I'm also interested in recovery times for grass.

[EDIT]

I have enough land that if I divide it evenly into 32 paddocks, each of which will be grazed for one day in a cycle (giving the grass a 32 day recovery time) then the size of each paddock is 20m x 20m or 0.04ha. According to this 0.04ha holds about 160kg of dry matter (DM). From the same source a 60kg sheep requires about 1.8kg of DM per day. Bringing these together I can supposedly stock 89 sheep in my 20x20m paddock. That sounds very high, would they even fit in!? Does this seem about right or have my calculations gone wrong somewhere?

Thanks for any help!

If i'm doing your maths right you talking about a stocking rate of 89 sheep on 3.16 acres, or about 28 sheep per acre. I think your calculations may be off a little. You should maybe start off with around 4/5 ewes per acre and rotate them round a few times until you get a better idea of what the ground can sensibly sustain.

0.04ha with 160kg dry matter is where your problem is I believe. Your sheep would need to eat off equivilant to 4000kg DM/Ha per day, Even if it was there for them to eat, I can't see it all growing back in 32 days.
Also DM intake pretty much doubles for lactating ewes, so you'd need to make it nearer 8000kg DM/Ha, this isnt realistic.

HPG is good but it may take you a little while before building up to this productivity....

PS forgive me if my sums are wrong, i'm knackerd from lambing and the numbers are spinning round my head a bit.

 

[JohnGalway]

If I might offer an observation and make a suggestion.

HPG is a part of Holistic Management. Going only on the question in the opening post, are you looking simply for a grazing system or a management system, as they're not the same thing. Savory has said for a long time HM isn't a grazing system, and that all grazing systems fail without proper management i.e. HM.

As I'm only yet doing the training I'll make two suggestions, first no doubt you're smarter than I and you may get on well by buying and reading Holistic Management (Third edition) and Holistic Management Handbook (third edition) - in that order. There's formulas in the books that will help answer the question.

Secondly, what I would recommend is to check out the 3LM website and get some training. I sound like a walking advert but I struggled with both books and found the online training a great help.

 

[Samcowman]

How many sheep has it had on before? Start there and get your head around it before getting more.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Hey Pete, thanks for your advice. That's in the same ballpark as the number I quoted above, which is encouraging. So when you say grazing stock you mean you borrow livestock? Do the owners pay you for that? How did you go about finding people for that and how do you determine a price for the service?

Why do you stock denser in the winter? Do you supplement feed in the winter? Do your livestock have shelter?

We basically just pawn our ranch out as a grazing service - what you'd call "tack sheep".
We run a mob in spring to help cycle the surplus as it's easier to find (eg) 600 hoggets for 4 months than find the equivalent in cattle, and then we run a winter mob of 350 or so.
Wintertime is where the $$$$ are for us, with this system, generally the p/w rates are 20-40% higher than summer rates.

Stocking density is what protects the land and plants and thus the stock, in summer I'm busier at work and the grass is growing, so I compromise. Wintertime, it's more critical to get it right.

And, it's softer then so it's more rewarding for the soil to do it right, we can pockmark the surface and improve the infiltration at this time, summer it's often too dry.

We charge:
summer hoggets $1.50pw
winter hoggets $1.80pw

Calves $9, going up to $14 in May
R2 $16, going up to $30 in May

this year our winter ewe lambs are on $1.50pw flat rate, plus we're lambing them in springtime and keeping half the lamb crop at weaning for the trouble, we have bought 30 weaned beef calves thru a stock firm, another 35 on a pw basis, plus our own steers.
Our cow/calf mob is just running with the ewe lambs in the meantime, we'll pull them out pre-lambing.

Back in the day our ranch ran 480 sheep conventionally, which is less than our winter stocking rate using planned grazing

 

[eastdevonhobbyist]

If I might offer an observation and make a suggestion.

HPG is a part of Holistic Management. Going only on the question in the opening post, are you looking simply for a grazing system or a management system, as they're not the same thing. Savory has said for a long time HM isn't a grazing system, and that all grazing systems fail without proper management i.e. HM.

As I'm only yet doing the training I'll make two suggestions, first no doubt you're smarter than I and you may get on well by buying and reading Holistic Management (Third edition) and Holistic Management Handbook (third edition) - in that order. There's formulas in the books that will help answer the question.

Secondly, what I would recommend is to check out the 3LM website and get some training. I sound like a walking advert but I struggled with both books and found the online training a great help.

Hi John,

Thanks for your advice. Yes I am at least going to experiment with holistic management. I'm halfway through the audiobook of Holistic Management, which is good for an overview but the lack of diagrams and tables means its not useful for in depth study. With your recommendation I have ordered the handbook in traditional form. After I've read both I will consider a training from 3LM.

You asked whether I'm looking for a management system or a grazing system. I suppose what I'm really looking for is the very rough outline of a plan to utilize about 7/10ths of a hectare of land that is currently pasture for the following outcomes in order of priority: Ecological health, carbon sequestration, enjoyment, profit. I have a larger amount of land but am dedicating a part of it to new woodland. How much new woodland, what new fencing and the shape and size of remaining pasture are all still to be determined and will likely be influenced by the plan for the pasture. Since I want to plant the trees this winter, this puts a time limit on how long I have to decide on these matters, so I'm trying to get the a rough plan for the pasture as soon as possible. That's why rather than gain a full and deep understanding of HM, I am trying to source some rough numbers which will allow me to make decisions now (on fencing and such) that I wont regret too much later.

Thanks for your advice!

 

[eastdevonhobbyist]

We basically just pawn our ranch out as a grazing service - what you'd call "tack sheep".
We run a mob in spring to help cycle the surplus as it's easier to find (eg) 600 hoggets for 4 months than find the equivalent in cattle, and then we run a winter mob of 350 or so.
Wintertime is where the $$$$ are for us, with this system, generally the p/w rates are 20-40% higher than summer rates.

Stocking density is what protects the land and plants and thus the stock, in summer I'm busier at work and the grass is growing, so I compromise. Wintertime, it's more critical to get it right.

And, it's softer then so it's more rewarding for the soil to do it right, we can pockmark the surface and improve the infiltration at this time, summer it's often too dry.

We charge:
summer hoggets $1.50pw
winter hoggets $1.80pw

Calves $9, going up to $14 in May
R2 $16, going up to $30 in May

this year our winter ewe lambs are on $1.50pw flat rate, plus we're lambing them in springtime and keeping half the lamb crop at weaning for the trouble, we have bought 30 weaned beef calves thru a stock firm, another 35 on a pw basis, plus our own steers.
Our cow/calf mob is just running with the ewe lambs in the meantime, we'll pull them out pre-lambing.

Back in the day our ranch ran 480 sheep conventionally, which is less than our winter stocking rate using planned grazing

Wow thanks for real data and numbers! Can be hard to get.

Can you just give me a sentence on how a higher stocking density "protects the land and plants"? Is it because there is a commensurate longer recovery time?

I have a mostly unrelated question but maybe you can answer it. Do you think it is OK/humane/practical to use a paddock size of 20mx10m with about 5 cows or up to 40 sheep in it and daily moves? This paddock size seems very small to me, but from youtube videos it doesn't seem far off what some people are using. If I can use paddock sizes this small then I can allow my pasture up to 64 days recovery time, which would seem good to have as an option, as opposed to having a maximum recovery time of 32 days with double sized paddocks.

Thanks for your help!

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Wow thanks for real data and numbers! Can be hard to get.

Can you just give me a sentence on how a higher stocking density "protects the land and plants"? Is it because there is a commensurate longer recovery time?

I have a mostly unrelated question but maybe you can answer it. Do you think it is OK/humane/practical to use a paddock size of 20mx10m with about 5 cows or up to 40 sheep in it and daily moves? This paddock size seems very small to me, but from youtube videos it doesn't seem far off what some people are using. If I can use paddock sizes this small then I can allow my pasture up to 64 days recovery time, which would seem good to have as an option, as opposed to having a maximum recovery time of 32 days with double sized paddocks.

Thanks for your help!

In one sentence

The higher density grazing works better because overgrazing is a product of time, not numbers - with more smaller paddocks you can move them before they again bite regrowing plants - and they're always growing in the springtime, so overgrazing occurs very quickly.

More paddocks - less overgrazing, more area recovering.

The other sentence about overgrazing is that the first bite of the plant is stored solar energy - but the second bite (of regrowth, not simply eating more of the plant) comes from the root reserve of energy, keep eating regrowth and your plants and roots get smaller and smaller.

 

[Guleesh]

Can you clarify how many acres or hectares you have to use for this? It seems to change between posts. 1.28 Ha in OP, then you mention 0.7 Ha in post #8 then back to 1.28 Ha for post #9.

Glad to see a reduction for the 1.28 Ha scenario of 40 sheep rather than 89 as first proposed but that still leaves you with a stocking rate of 13 sheep per acre which still seems a bit high? What condition is the ground in at present? Are you planning on keeping sheep/cows out on grazing all year round or just for the summer? Have you kept any livestock previously?

Asking people on a forum to tell you the stocking rate and grass recovery time of a piece of ground they've never seen isn't going to give you any answers, it's something you need to work out for yourself over time.

Just because the numbers may work out nicely for one round of grazing, it doesn't necessarily mean it will work out the next time round, there are many factors that you aren't considering and more things to assess before you can decide a stocking rate, since it is a feasibility study you are doing maybe it would be wise to use more feasible stocking rates for your calculations.

Although I'd encourage you to try HPG and am tending towards something along those lines myself I think you need to realise HPG isn't really about being able to run ultra high stocking rates, it's about running a grazing operation in a way that is sustainable by not neglecting any aspects of its operation that will lead to its collapse. To manage holistically is to consider everything that is required for the system as a whole to survive and thrive. It isn't a magical grazing formula that allows you to put a silly amount of animals on a piece of ground and feed them all year round.

Sorry if it isn't what you want to read, I'm not trying to burst your bubble, just trying to gently lower your expectations to something a little more realistic.

 

[AndrewM]

hi, im no expert, only recently moved from set stocking to simple rotational grazing here, but i think you have gotten yourself into a jumble with all the different types of grazing strategies out there your numbers look out somewhat.

intensive rotational grazing practiced by many dairy farmers would be entering covers at 2500-3000kg/DM and grazing it down to a target of 1500kg DM, giving them 1000-1500kg of available DM per ha per grazing. They would be applying fertilizer after most grazing and returning 18-30days later to graze again depending on the time of year.

from my understanding holistic grazing particularly on dry land would be grazing much higher covers 4000-6000kg DM/Ha but they would not be grazing down to anything like 1500 kgDM/Ha they would want to trample alot of that DM back into the soil and leave behind a higher residual. therefore much less actual available DM to the stock than your calculations. I think they would also have a much longer rotation in the region of 90days or so.

I have also seen a regenerative no input system for milder climates, they seem to be grazing higher covers 3000-4000kgDM/Ha but leaving much higher covers than 1500kg so they are only grazing to top leaves of the plants to stop it setting seed. 30-60 day rotations with lots of clover in the sward. i think then they are using that bank of DM when there a drought or for winter grazing later in the year.

here i have 50 store cattle -450ish kg grazing 0.5Ha of flood plain meadows every 36 hours. field was last grazed last October, had 30kg/Ha N in march. hope to be back in 30 days or so following another 30kgN, but there will only be enough grass for 24 hours i should think. later in the summer i expand my grazing platform using my silage ground, rotation lengths get longer to cope with the reduced grass growth during the summer.

 

[Rod Dumbreck]

Hi,

I'm just doing a feasibility study into running a holistic planned grazing sheep/goat/beef/dairy operation. I'm having trouble finding recommended or example stocking densities for south west UK farms using this system. Does anyone have experience with holistic planned grazing that could offer some advice on this or point me in the right direction? I'm also interested in recovery times for grass.

[EDIT]

I have enough land that if I divide it evenly into 32 paddocks, each of which will be grazed for one day in a cycle (giving the grass a 32 day recovery time) then the size of each paddock is 20m x 20m or 0.04ha. According to this 0.04ha holds about 160kg of dry matter (DM). From the same source a 60kg sheep requires about 1.8kg of DM per day. Bringing these together I can supposedly stock 89 sheep in my 20x20m paddock. That sounds very high, would they even fit in!? Does this seem about right or have my calculations gone wrong somewhere?

Thanks for any help!

Question rather than an answer, is the DM figure (4000kg it seems here) what is available totally, or what should be grazed before moving on. Some say only graze one third of total, but Im very much at the beginning of this learning.

 

[clod hopper]

[QUOTE="AndrewM, post: 6928338, mem

I have also seen a regenerative no input system for milder climates, they seem to be grazing higher covers 3000-4000kgDM/Ha but leaving much higher covers than 1500kg so they are only grazing to top leaves of the plants to stop it setting seed. 30-60 day rotations with lots of clover in the sward. i think then they are using that bank of DM when there a drought or for winter grazing later in the year.

[/QUOTE]
This is more or less what I do. I do drop to 20 day round in spring and about 50 days in winter/summer

 

[Agrivator]

It seems that holistic grazing works better if you smoke pot and worship trees. And it is essential that none of your family or ancestors has ever voted Conservative.

That is why there are no reliable comparisons in terms of animal health and productivity between holistic grazing and the more normal well-managed setstocking or rotational grazing systems.

 

[Guleesh]

It seems that holistic grazing works better if you smoke pot and worship trees. And it is essential that none of your family or ancestors has ever voted Conservative.

That is why there are no reliable comparisons in terms of animal health and productivity between holistic grazing and the more normal well-managed setstocking or rotational grazing systems.

It also seems to be about getting away from the worshipping of and absolute faith and belief in animal pharmaceutical companies, and the continual sacrifices and offerings of income unnecessarily made to them.

Maybe true that the pot smoking, tree worshipping and non conservative voting types you so eloquently describe, may initially be attracted (like moths to a light) to the word 'holistic' but after a few fence moves out in long wet grass in the rain I doubt they'll keep it up.

 

[Agrivator]

It also seems to be about getting away from the worshipping of and absolute faith and belief in animal pharmaceutical companies, and the continual sacrifices and offerings of income unnecessarily made to them.

Maybe true that the pot smoking, tree worshipping and non conservative voting types you so eloquently describe, may initially be attracted (like moths to a light) to the word 'holistic' but after a few fence moves out in long wet grass in the rain I doubt they'll keep it up.

I'm not surprised they're also impotent.

And if they're not impotent now, they might well be when they are bitten by the proliferation of ticks which such a peculiar grazing system is bound to encourage.

 

[eastdevonhobbyist]

[QUOTE="AndrewM, post: 6928338, mem

I have also seen a regenerative no input system for milder climates, they seem to be grazing higher covers 3000-4000kgDM/Ha but leaving much higher covers than 1500kg so they are only grazing to top leaves of the plants to stop it setting seed. 30-60 day rotations with lots of clover in the sward. i think then they are using that bank of DM when there a drought or for winter grazing later in the year.

This is more or less what I do. I do drop to 20 day round in spring and about 50 days in winter/summer
[/QUOTE]

I see. How do you adjust your round time, do you make the paddocks bigger, leave sections ungrazed or bring in more livestock from off the farm?

 

[eastdevonhobbyist]

Question rather than an answer, is the DM figure (4000kg it seems here) what is available totally, or what should be grazed before moving on. Some say only graze one third of total, but Im very much at the beginning of this learning.

Good point, that is what's available totally. So do you think I should then so reduce my 89 sheep estimate by 2/3rds to about 30?

 

[eastdevonhobbyist]

hi, im no expert, only recently moved from set stocking to simple rotational grazing here, but i think you have gotten yourself into a jumble with all the different types of grazing strategies out there your numbers look out somewhat.

intensive rotational grazing practiced by many dairy farmers would be entering covers at 2500-3000kg/DM and grazing it down to a target of 1500kg DM, giving them 1000-1500kg of available DM per ha per grazing. They would be applying fertilizer after most grazing and returning 18-30days later to graze again depending on the time of year.

from my understanding holistic grazing particularly on dry land would be grazing much higher covers 4000-6000kg DM/Ha but they would not be grazing down to anything like 1500 kgDM/Ha they would want to trample alot of that DM back into the soil and leave behind a higher residual. therefore much less actual available DM to the stock than your calculations. I think they would also have a much longer rotation in the region of 90days or so.

I have also seen a regenerative no input system for milder climates, they seem to be grazing higher covers 3000-4000kgDM/Ha but leaving much higher covers than 1500kg so they are only grazing to top leaves of the plants to stop it setting seed. 30-60 day rotations with lots of clover in the sward. i think then they are using that bank of DM when there a drought or for winter grazing later in the year.

here i have 50 store cattle -450ish kg grazing 0.5Ha of flood plain meadows every 36 hours. field was last grazed last October, had 30kg/Ha N in march. hope to be back in 30 days or so following another 30kgN, but there will only be enough grass for 24 hours i should think. later in the summer i expand my grazing platform using my silage ground, rotation lengths get longer to cope with the reduced grass growth during the summer.

Hi Andrew,
Thanks, that's a lot of good information. Will take me a while to get my head around it. My main take away is that I shouldn't plan on grazing to the ground. I should be leaving 50% or more DM when moving on. Essentially, changing nothing else about my grazing plan I'd need to reduce my livestock weight by half or more. I think I will err on the side of caution and start with a very low number of animals.

Question: do cattle eat from the top down then? Like, they'll eat the top fo the grass stalks across the enclosure, hen if still hungry they'll go back and take more off each plant? I would have assumed they eat one plant down to the ground and then move on until full?