"Improving Our Lot" - Planned Holistic Grazing, for starters..

Kiwi Pete

Member
Livestock Farmer
Aldo Leopold

"A Sand County Almanac "

Written in 1948, but a classic of conservation / regenerative writing & still very relevant today
One of my favourite books & I recommend everyone read it.
It won't give any solutions or recipes or prescriptions, but it will make you think. Besides, it's an enjoyable read.
For me, it was possibly life changing . . .

View attachment 727848 View attachment 727850 View attachment 727852 View attachment 727854 View attachment 727856 View attachment 727860 View attachment 727862
I am about a third of the way through.
Trying hard to ration it, so I can absorb it better :rolleyes:
 

hendrebc

Member
Livestock Farmer
Does anyone have any before and after pictures of somewhere they have done any regenerative/holistic/mob (insert preferred name) showing how much more diverse and better (hopefully!) the grass is.
Trying to make a case to get some funding for a proper trial of this sort of thing to compare it to other types of grazing systems. Been suggested we should bring our own picture to the meetings because the people we are applying to can't be arsed to watch videos and open and read links we send them :banghead::banghead:
Pm if preferred :)
 

Treg

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cornwall
go for it, I missed an NFU meeting a few days ago and was going to bring up the same sort of thing, that and the so called enviro schemes being a load of crap (y)

the main one I am thinking of is about 2 acres nearly in the middle of a nine acre field, they have been there 40 years not a serous amount but enough to notice
Thanks @Henarar , I go to these meetings thinking I'm going to come across as a woolly jumpered hippee ( though will wear a hoodie to confuse them ) & everybody else is saying the same thing! So why doesn't that filter through to the top?
Mind you the South West branches have got a name for being rebellious :whistle:
 

Kiwi Pete

Member
Livestock Farmer
Does anyone have any before and after pictures of somewhere they have done any regenerative/holistic/mob (insert preferred name) showing how much more diverse and better (hopefully!) the grass is.
Trying to make a case to get some funding for a proper trial of this sort of thing to compare it to other types of grazing systems. Been suggested we should bring our own picture to the meetings because the people we are applying to can't be arsed to watch videos and open and read links we send them :banghead::banghead:
Pm if preferred :)
I am missing my early (takeover day) pictures from my phone but still have loads of picture records - quite surprising to see the change in a bit over 2 years!!
Will have a further dig but here is a start.
Screenshot_20181016-223653_Gallery.jpg

Tank paddock, probably about January, you can see my long-tailed ram lambs if you know where to look. The lambs born this year are from them.
Anyway, new grass undersown under a triticale wholecrop, very patchy clover, and lots of bare ground.
Screenshot_20181016-224148_Gallery.jpg

Late in the season, these will be the first ewe lambs we bought, same paddock.

Fast forward a year to December, paddock allowed to fully recover and mob grazed.
Screenshot_20181016-230032_Gallery.jpg
Screenshot_20181016-230000_Gallery.jpg
Screenshot_20181016-225916_Gallery.jpg
Screenshot_20181016-225941_Gallery.jpg

Fast forward another 10 months, to now
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In 30 months it has had about 4kg of plantain seed, 12 litres of homemade liquid seaweed, and fences. Quite a change!
I have taken a cut of silage and a cut of baleage off it as well.

You can only imagine the contrast in the "bad" paddocks.
 

Treg

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cornwall
I am missing my early (takeover day) pictures from my phone but still have loads of picture records - quite surprising to see the change in a bit over 2 years!!
Will have a further dig but here is a start.View attachment 727916
Tank paddock, probably about January, you can see my long-tailed ram lambs if you know where to look. The lambs born this year are from them.
Anyway, new grass undersown under a triticale wholecrop, very patchy clover, and lots of bare ground. View attachment 727920
Late in the season, these will be the first ewe lambs we bought, same paddock.

Fast forward a year to December, paddock allowed to fully recover and mob grazed.View attachment 727922 View attachment 727924 View attachment 727926 View attachment 727928
Fast forward another 10 months, to nowView attachment 727930 View attachment 727932 View attachment 727940 View attachment 727944
In 30 months it has had about 4kg of plantain seed, 12 litres of homemade liquid seaweed, and fences. Quite a change!
I have taken a cut of silage and a cut of baleage off it as well.

You can only imagine the contrast in the "bad" paddocks.
When you say 4kg plantain Kp, over what area?
 
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Kiwi Pete

Member
Livestock Farmer
When you say 4kg plantain Kp over what area?
It's about 2.3 hectares, and I ran out before the middle. :sorry:

The interesting thing for me is how loose it is now - it was one of those standard-benders as it was badly compacted.
The old owner had had a try at no-input beet and that was OK except he couldn't get it harvested before he left for Arizona.... long story short, the guy who fed and looked the stock tipped 130 cattle out of the tunnel each day and put half them in each beet paddock, so it was definitely going to be one of those "took forever to come back" paddocks with subsoilers etc
But it really has healed quickly after the change in management style, it certainly has the growth of a new pasture but it doesn't need "babied along" as it is incredibly resilient.
This farm grows an awful lot of good feed now, it only used to carry 220 ewes back in the day.
It can carry about 500 sheep over winter or at least it did this time, and calves. And have a shed full of cattle at the same time.. plus 400 store lambs over summer.... so it is easily twice as productive as the old way: lime, superphosphate, and everything spread all over the farm nipping regrowth.

Some of it is grazing management, but a lot of it is getting the sheep:cattle ratio right, IMO
 

Henarar

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Somerset
Thanks @Henarar , I go to these meetings thinking I'm going to come across as a woolly jumpered hippee ( though will wear a hoodie to confuse them ) & everybody else is saying the same thing! So why doesn't that filter through to the top?
Mind you the South West branches have got a name for being rebellious :whistle:
TBO I am quite useless at meetings mostly sit there and say f all hence why I keep on about dragging them in to the 21st century but that's a whole other topic, although this thread proves that a sensible conversation can be had online
even with Pete involved :D:ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
 

Treg

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cornwall

Treg

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cornwall
TBO I am quite useless at meetings mostly sit there and say f all hence why I keep on about dragging them in to the 21st century but that's a whole other topic, although this thread proves that a sensible conversation can be had online
even with Pete involved :D:ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
Yeah I'm the same , get nervous about speaking but the meeting went well, very interesting & got my points across.
I think I was probably one of the youngest there & probably one of the smallest farms, so it's important to go & get your points of view across.
 

Karliboy

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
West Yorkshire
you do know that to many can kill them ?

I didn’t no.
Learn something new every day
Thankfully we have never had any problems in the past and we have lots off oak trees and I’m sure it must have happened before.
Thanks for the heads up though(y) I’ll bear that in mind if anything does fall I’ll infuture at this time of year
 

Henarar

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Somerset
I didn’t no.
Learn something new every day
Thankfully we have never had any problems in the past and we have lots off oak trees and I’m sure it must have happened before.
Thanks for the heads up though(y) I’ll bear that in mind if anything does fall I’ll infuture at this time of year
keep an eye on them especially if one gets a real taste of them and just hangs around eating them/always first to the trees that type of thing, I try to move them to a field with no acorns after a few days then back again, if there is a real glut I fence them off or spread dung under the trees
 

Kiwi Pete

Member
Livestock Farmer
Now if we could put more of a dairy spin on things .just to suit the odd balls here like myself what variations might we see as numbers are more set
I practised on a dairy unit before we came here.
It almost sounds like bragging but the season before I started they had treated 160 cows in a 700 cow herd with AB's
Used 260 tons of grain
Used 125 tons of urea
Cows produced 340kgMS/cow

First season we used 60 tons of grain
20 tons of urea
treated 19 cows with AB
Cows produced 380kgMS/cow

second season it went dry during summer
We used 18 tons of grain
Treated 4 cows from 726
5 tons of urea in late summer
Cows produced 412kg/cow
Made baleage from the dairy platform for the first time, topped 23/260 hectares

So with 3 salaried staff (including me) and a drop in dairy payout you can imagine the profit/productivity increase, simply by cutting out the crap you shouldn't need and managing covers with a plan in mind
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 80 42.3%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 66 34.9%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 15.9%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.7%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

  • 1,292
  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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