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

[Kiwi Pete]

x2, and graze tighter

Thanks for clearing that up. I would say, "have a play with it" eg if you know the daytime allocation, maybe split it 60/40 with a fence and roll it up after breakfast - each time you double stock density, you increase the herd effect by 2x2

there is such a big difference between them each having 40m² and each having 10m² four times, in terms of what their hoof action can do without making them "tidy it up" by eating what doesn't want to be et.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

If they were shitting like that then they needed more brown feed to help buffer the rocket fuel. So grazing at 4 leaf rather than 3 leaf. Maybe need to buffer feed for longer to let your grass to get more mature. Let nature do what nutritionists would advise doing by feeding them straw (cost). Dung scoring and knowing what to do with it is pretty useful.
Pete with your flerd by less control of grazing do you mean you had to drop your density to give them enough room to coexist?

Yes, we just battled to get to 100T/ha and still have "sleep-ability" in all weathers

May have been different if I was a full-timer, and bought more kit to put up in front of them... I will never know that one.
Once you get over that wee hump in front of you, there's a whole new world, right now 150T/ha looks like like "spread out", once the grass gets a bit of grunt in it you can see that you really need all the density you can muster

 

[onesiedale]

Too much area at a time, perhaps, going by your list of symptoms?

What we saw here with the flerd is that it doesn't begin as an overstocking thing - less control of the grazing meant less carrying capacity so "it appears we are overstocked" when we aren't really - more we're bordering on overgrazing - too much quality, not enough quantity in other words

..."understocked and overgrazed"

 

[som farmer]

couple of snaps of large plantain, you can just see the tip of my boot, to judge there size, as a guide, my wellies are size 14. It's nice to see all the clover coming up, and not to much of the dreaded brown rust, not a huge amount of rye grass here, perhaps that might be the reason ! There still looks to be plenty of feed value left in this sward, but dare not stock it with cattle, pity, but as l said before, l will guarantee the wooly maggots will increase in weight.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

..."understocked and overgrazed"

Yes, that's what we see everywhere, and that's where we sit

I suppose you could liken it to touring car racing, most people are scared to drive fast because "crashing" is in mind

young guys like driving fast and assume that having no tread, mag wheels, no suspension travel and a loud exhaust makes them a touring-car driver, but it actually makes their car less safe at speed

then the racing driver feels unsafe going slow because the tyres go cold, the brakes go cold, and there's no downforce - this car is built to perform better the harder you drive it, just as a grass system needs to be driven hard

but, you can't always see those other perspectives from where you are now

 

[Rob Garrett]

Yes, that's what we see everywhere, and that's where we sit

I suppose you could liken it to touring car racing, most people are scared to drive fast because "crashing" is in mind

young guys like driving fast and assume that having no tread, mag wheels, no suspension travel and a loud exhaust makes them a touring-car driver, but it actually makes their car less safe at speed

then the racing driver feels unsafe going slow because the tyres go cold, the brakes go cold, and there's no downforce - this car is built to perform better the harder you drive it, just as a grass system needs to be driven hard

but, you can't always see those other perspectives from where you are now

Hmmm... Rethinking the flerd idea now, only done it to give more paddocks/rest. Keeping sheep tight with cow/calves this year has been a challenge to say the least (sheep!). Now thinking more/smaller cells on hopefully longer grass, sheep in am out pm, cows/calves in pm = less green more brown (roughage) for cows.

 

[Nsoiled]

Hmmm... Rethinking the flerd idea now, only done it to give more paddocks/rest. Keeping sheep tight with cow/calves this year has been a challenge to say the least (sheep!). Now thinking more/smaller cells on hopefully longer grass, sheep in am out pm, cows/calves in pm = less green more brown (roughage) for cows.

Guess the question is here, one of them at least, is: what are your target utilisation rates for these breaks?

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Hmmm... Rethinking the flerd idea now, only done it to give more paddocks/rest. Keeping sheep tight with cow/calves this year has been a challenge to say the least (sheep!). Now thinking more/smaller cells on hopefully longer grass, sheep in am out pm, cows/calves in pm = less green more brown (roughage) for cows.

One compromise, is to go easy with the sheep - maybe just drift them easily around, but rotate the cattle? They can be your "heavy lifters" to an extent, as they are much easier to manage with silly-string, and you can plan what parts of the farm need their impact the most, and just target those

we still do similar with our mobs, because their overnight break is where the magic really is:

don't need to draw a map!

it might just be a matter of leveraging your "high density" plans to boost your low-density constraints, just as the dairymen can use young/dry stock as tools to support their dairy grazing.

 

[som farmer]

when we had sucklers, accountant told us, the sucklers should only get, what the sheep leave behind. To max grass food value, that probably works well in your paddock systems

 

[Rob Garrett]

One compromise, is to go easy with the sheep - maybe just drift them easily around, but rotate the cattle? They can be your "heavy lifters" to an extent, as they are much easier to manage with silly-string, and you can plan what parts of the farm need their impact the most, and just target those

we still do similar with our mobs, because their overnight break is where the magic really is:View attachment 1002370
don't need to draw a map!

it might just be a matter of leveraging your "high density" plans to boost your low-density constraints, just as the dairymen can use young/dry stock as tools to support their dairy grazing.

Awesome
You'll have me planning next!

 

[hendrebc]

Leader followers with sheep in front and cows behind works great but you need either more cattle to move the sheep forward when the cows have finished or get really good at knowing when to move the sheep so that so that cows aren't stuck behind for days clearing up when the sheep have left too much behind. Can be quite a balancing act at times.

 

[Nsoiled]

Seems the leader follower system is better with a full rotation between each stock class. Esp as rejection from sheep fouling will be reasonable with cattle following immediately.

 

[Rob Garrett]

Seems the leader follower system is better with a full rotation between each stock class. Esp as rejection from sheep fouling will be reasonable with cattle following immediately.

Yes good point, noticed that this year when moving cows onto paddocks where sheep had " self moved" too overnight! Cows walking round more, whereas in a clean paddock it's heads down & eat.

 

[Samcowman]

Would it be better to plan for the cattle and just have the sheep floating around just in front and move them on when the cows need a shift whilst the lambs are on the ewes once the lambs are away then would it work to have the ewes on tidy up behind the cows. Or would their grazing habit not suit that? This is coming from a non sheep person.

 

[hendrebc]

Would it be better to plan for the cattle and just have the sheep floating around just in front and move them on when the cows need a shift whilst the lambs are on the ewes once the lambs are away then would it work to have the ewes on tidy up behind the cows. Or would their grazing habit not suit that? This is coming from a non sheep person.

Yeah that would work if you can match the size of the mobs. Ideally you want the following mob to be the biggest mob so when they have cleaned up behind you have to move the leader and following mob if the leader mob is bigger you can end up moving them before the follower mob is ready to move and once the follower mob is behind its hard for them to catch up without the leader mob grazing lower to slow them down.

 

[Percy Veer]

One compromise, is to go easy with the sheep - maybe just drift them easily around, but rotate the cattle? They can be your "heavy lifters" to an extent, as they are much easier to manage with silly-string, and you can plan what parts of the farm need their impact the most, and just target those

we still do similar with our mobs, because their overnight break is where the magic really is:

I had plenty of grass this year, (Hay height) and I set up tight electric fences for my ewes and lambs so that they ate a third, trampled a third and left a third. I moved them once a day.

It worked really well for the grass - the regrowth of the herbal leys was fantastic.

Unfortunately it didn't suit the sheep. I ended up with scrawny ewes and lambs.

I'm at a bit of a loss as to what I should do next year.

 

[Crofter64]

not so much the leafy bit, but you get a lot of stem left, and it's that, which causes the problem, it doesn't seem to 'disappear', then the cows leave it, which makes the problem worse, next time, which is why l said it is difficult to manage, it's a very fine line, between to tight, and to much, not helped by variable weather. Which is why we have found 'stocking the grass' is a better way, for us. A timely topping, will still give a 'litter', perhaps not ideal, but we are still learning.
On p/p, l am quite certain it can be quite easily improved by management, you just need faith, perhaps lacking, in previous paragraph, the cost savings, and the carbon angle, in pp could be huge, reseeding costs a fortune, and sure we are often 'talked' into it, by reps, teaching, and tradition. We need to adjust management, to match.
There is now another angle to cope with, fuel and fert, which obviously going to cause some serious thinking. Which is why we are trialling a few different ideas, legumes d/d into p/p, offer an alternative to fert, but more importantly, increase the food value, of 1st cut, P/p versus ley grass, shows a big difference in silage analysis, and quality fodder, adds lots to the bottom line. There are many different types of legumes, and increasing them in the sward is a must, the drawback, is traditionally they don't produce for 1st cut, some do, so trying them, could be helpful. Not sure how regular over seeding p/p with an annual crop of a very early legume, should be classed as, not sure if it will prove worth doing, time will tell.
Going back to pp and it's food value, as silage, could well be we are not cutting it, at it's best time, there is still a lot to learn, but the days of milkers staying outside, all winter, are over, it is no longer practical to do, which immediately increases the importance of quality fodder.
We are moving forward, with yesterdays practices, which is making things rather awkward, but somewhere between the two, there should be a balance, which works. In theory, should be simple, we have tools, that were not available then, but it isn't. And yet we have to.

Any luck grazing first bite and then leaving the field for silage?Let the legumes get into their stride?

 

[Guleesh]

I had plenty of grass this year, (Hay height) and I set up tight electric fences for my ewes and lambs so that they ate a third, trampled a third and left a third. I moved them once a day.

It worked really well for the grass - the regrowth of the herbal leys was fantastic.

Unfortunately it didn't suit the sheep. I ended up with scrawny ewes and lambs.

I'm at a bit of a loss as to what I should do next year.

We've also found it near impossible to to keep both the sheep and the grass moving forwards at the same time, I think you need to be quite hard on the sheep at the times of year when you can get away with it.

My take on it is that basically all the energy comes from the sun, and the sheeps' back is one place you can store it, and also use it when required. The soil is another place you can store sunlight and use it when required, and it simply has to take the hit at those times of the year when the sheep can't be compromised, this doesn't mean that the 'damage' done to the ground can't be reversed by those same sheep when the pressure isn't on them, and that from year to year the place can't still be moving forward as a whole. All about getting the balance right.

The other thing worth mentioning is we've found big differences between individual animals when brought in and stuck on long grass behind an electric fence, they can be from the same place and all similar condition going in but after a few weeks it becomes apparent that some sheep will be growing fat before your eyes, whilst others just seem to melt, they just can't cope with it.

 

[Crofter64]

This works out at around 1200hd/ha, in that cell I thought it was a bit over a tenth and it was a bit under. Joys of short legs and tall grass.View attachment 1002102
this was about 3m² each

How often do you move them in a density like that?Set times or whenever it looks like they need a feed?

 

[som farmer]

Any luck grazing first bite and then leaving the field for silage?Let the legumes get into their stride?

that is an option, and under consideration, but very different to 'normal', arse about face, however, it could work well, we sort of do it, with our cut only leys, so much pit, and so much high Protein wrapped, 1 bale day, in the mixer. Another option, we are trying, is earlier growing clover, balsana, it's been dd into some pp, and is up, and growing, results, good or bad, will be announces next year.

On the 'leader/follower' talked about above, surely the 'rotation/type' stock, should be arranged, in either what needs, or highest value, should always be first, then in descending order of 'value'.

Again, having been told for years, about clean grazing, to control/lessen the worm burden, it sort of defeats that theory. Unless a long enough gap between, which l don't think is being intended. As always, one has to find a balance. Not always the easiest thing to do.