Shelter and rotational grazing

Northern territory

Member
Livestock Farmer
We have been roationally grazing for several years now lambs intially graze silage fields set stcked then at 4 to 2 weeks old they move to rotaionally grazing but in smaller mobs that are then joined up
For example the 1st 120 doubles will go into 4 mobs of 30 on silage field then into 2 mobs of 60 for the 1st 2 moves on rotation then into one mob of 120 on 3rd move.
Seems to work well they need time to learn in smaller groups especialy if using electrified polywire.
The ewes are stocked 8-10 ewes per acre and the rotation varies on grass growth and demand but aim for moving paddocks every 2 to 4 days.
Tried larger mobs and move daily but had to much problems with cocci, worms and scald.
We have fields marched by rivers with no shelter from hedges etc and never had any problems with 4 week old lambs and its not that nice of weather in march here in NI.
Very interesting about scald in large mobs, that is something we continually struggle with.
 

exmoor dave

Member
Location
exmoor, uk
I'm reluctant to admit, but i move the odd holly sapling about to make shelter.

Didtcha know it's also the most extraordinary sound dampener too? The curvy leaves apparently disperse sound.


We've only got a few rather out grown holly hedges in mid hight part of the farm,
Top is gorse and the odd bit of beech that the yanks didn't blow up/ bulldoze out
Valley is overwhelmingly elm

Up above porlock, overlooking the sea its all holly on top of banks, must be a tremendous asset
 

egbert

Member
Livestock Farmer
We've only got a few rather out grown holly hedges in mid hight part of the farm,
Top is gorse and the odd bit of beech that the yanks didn't blow up/ bulldoze out
Valley is overwhelmingly elm

Up above porlock, overlooking the sea its all holly on top of banks, must be a tremendous asset
imagine the labour it takes to set such things up...only for half of it to be torn out decades/centuries later.
now we're talking about kick starting the same thing all over, only without the shelter!

My boundaries up here are all stone, and where we've properly set them right -IE double skinned, head height, and 5' through-, they given fantastic shelter.
(A slight downside is the £100+/m cost)
Finding a balance between what can realistically be done now, and what was there 100-200 years ago isn't easy.
I work on the general principal that, here at least, there's only one person who decides, and that's the man stood in the field, with the cheque book in his pocket.
 

unlacedgecko

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Fife
imagine the labour it takes to set such things up...only for half of it to be torn out decades/centuries later.
now we're talking about kick starting the same thing all over, only without the shelter!

My boundaries up here are all stone, and where we've properly set them right -IE double skinned, head height, and 5' through-, they given fantastic shelter.
(A slight downside is the £100+/m cost)
Finding a balance between what can realistically be done now, and what was there 100-200 years ago isn't easy.
I work on the general principal that, here at least, there's only one person who decides, and that's the man stood in the field, with the cheque book in his pocket.

It's insane when you think about what has been lost.


When I lived in Gloucestershire there was 500+ acres within 1m mile of my house that were scrubby shite. Previously sheep grazed banks they'll never be farmed again. Too steep to clear with a machine and far too expensive to clear by hand.
 

exmoor dave

Member
Location
exmoor, uk
imagine the labour it takes to set such things up...only for half of it to be torn out decades/centuries later.
now we're talking about kick starting the same thing all over, only without the shelter!

My boundaries up here are all stone, and where we've properly set them right -IE double skinned, head height, and 5' through-, they given fantastic shelter.
(A slight downside is the £100+/m cost)
Finding a balance between what can realistically be done now, and what was there 100-200 years ago isn't easy.
I work on the general principal that, here at least, there's only one person who decides, and that's the man stood in the field, with the cheque book in his pocket.


Off topic, but we're directly across the vale from porlock hill, yet have a completely different style of field boundary- one sided walls, where the field level on the uphill side is level to the top of the wall, so historically the wall was only stock proof to the stock down hill from the wall.
The same style of wall rings the block against the cliffs, with a quite substantial wall built through the cliffs.
There's no trees on these single walls, there's gorse now, bit we don't know if there would have been historically.
Dad reckons thorn was cut elsewhere and moved to these walls as a dead hedge when say a crop was planted.
Should really look up the age, I reckon the single walls predate the remaining few banked/ walled both sides beech hedges.

There is a a iron age hill fort in the block and a ruined settlement mentioned in the doomsday book, plus various other bits that sit in age between the two.

Another field, approx 20acs, named "newfield' was enclosed from the moor, by a previous tenant, the story goes, he laid the last stone on the boundary wall and promptly died!
 

egbert

Member
Livestock Farmer
Off topic, but we're directly across the vale from porlock hill, yet have a completely different style of field boundary- one sided walls, where the field level on the uphill side is level to the top of the wall, so historically the wall was only stock proof to the stock down hill from the wall.
The same style of wall rings the block against the cliffs, with a quite substantial wall built through the cliffs.
There's no trees on these single walls, there's gorse now, bit we don't know if there would have been historically.
Dad reckons thorn was cut elsewhere and moved to these walls as a dead hedge when say a crop was planted.
Should really look up the age, I reckon the single walls predate the remaining few banked/ walled both sides beech hedges.

There is a a iron age hill fort in the block and a ruined settlement mentioned in the doomsday book, plus various other bits that sit in age between the two.

Another field, approx 20acs, named "newfield' was enclosed from the moor, by a previous tenant, the story goes, he laid the last stone on the boundary wall and promptly died!
Were the one sided walls one sided before soil runoff engulfed them but?

I've walls of every age from - maybe- bronze age.
There's one intersection where a drilled stone wall - post industrial revolution I guess- overlays a wall off uncut stone which is evidently much older.
Both sit on top of a stoned bank which is evidently much older again - and runs along the oldest boundaries on the inbye
 

Bury the Trash

Member
Mixed Farmer
That's the ticket.
No willow is poor for wind break after the initial novelty.
It lols and spues about everywhere and when you want windbreak like in the dead months its no good for it.
really it Needs damp ground as well.

And promptly died
That will be me when ive finished double fencing the last bit of hedge here.:cautious:
 

Karliboy

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
West Yorkshire
Off topic, but we're directly across the vale from porlock hill, yet have a completely different style of field boundary- one sided walls, where the field level on the uphill side is level to the top of the wall, so historically the wall was only stock proof to the stock down hill from the wall.
The same style of wall rings the block against the cliffs, with a quite substantial wall built through the cliffs.
There's no trees on these single walls, there's gorse now, bit we don't know if there would have been historically.
Dad reckons thorn was cut elsewhere and moved to these walls as a dead hedge when say a crop was planted.
Should really look up the age, I reckon the single walls predate the remaining few banked/ walled both sides beech hedges.

There is a a iron age hill fort in the block and a ruined settlement mentioned in the doomsday book, plus various other bits that sit in age between the two.

Another field, approx 20acs, named "newfield' was enclosed from the moor, by a previous tenant, the story goes, he laid the last stone on the boundary wall and promptly died!

i was going to say is there any manor houses as such looking out across your land.
around here walls would be banked up on one side with a ditch on the other so when you looked out from the house it was one big expanse if land without walls as they were hidden but looking back towards the house you could see all the walls.
 

exmoor dave

Member
Location
exmoor, uk
i was going to say is there any manor houses as such looking out across your land.
around here walls would be banked up on one side with a ditch on the other so when you looked out from the house it was one big expanse if land without walls as they were hidden but looking back towards the house you could see all the walls.


No none at all, the block in question is right on top, facing slightly down towards the brizzy channel, so can only really be seen from wales, a boat, or the sky
 

exmoor dave

Member
Location
exmoor, uk
Were the one sided walls one sided before soil runoff engulfed them but?

I've walls of every age from - maybe- bronze age.
There's one intersection where a drilled stone wall - post industrial revolution I guess- overlays a wall off uncut stone which is evidently much older.
Both sit on top of a stoned bank which is evidently much older again - and runs along the oldest boundaries on the inbye


No definitely built one sided, the walls on the cliffs are well below the plough line, the one sided walled banks are also up the sides of the fields, there is also a few along the top of fields, with the wall facing up hill forwards moorland.

There is even laneways linking the cliffs to the moor, where both inside faces of the lanes are walled, but not the outer.
 

unlacedgecko

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Fife
i was going to say is there any manor houses as such looking out across your land.
around here walls would be banked up on one side with a ditch on the other so when you looked out from the house it was one big expanse if land without walls as they were hidden but looking back towards the house you could see all the walls.
A ha ha wall.
 

egbert

Member
Livestock Farmer
No definitely built one sided, the walls on the cliffs are well below the plough line, the one sided walled banks are also up the sides of the fields, there is also a few along the top of fields, with the wall facing up hill forwards moorland.

There is even laneways linking the cliffs to the moor, where both inside faces of the lanes are walled, but not the outer.
a 'corn ditch' was a boundary that kept the stock out of your plough land, was it not?
 

exmoor dave

Member
Location
exmoor, uk
a 'corn ditch' was a boundary that kept the stock out of your plough land, was it not?


That's basically what dad thinks the walls were designed as, keeping stock from crops.
water for stock in most fields would have been a issue pre- pipes, so you have to wonder if cropping (cereals?) was favoured, we're dry upland so cereal crops by the era's standard was probably fine.

Stock on the moors and cliffs.
Grass meadows in the combes and hollows where there is water.

But it's almost certain that stock would have grazed the crop fields at some point as part of a crop rotation, you'd have thought.

It's fascinating!
 

Guleesh

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Isle of Skye
That's basically what dad thinks the walls were designed as, keeping stock from crops.
water for stock in most fields would have been a issue pre- pipes, so you have to wonder if cropping (cereals?) was favoured, we're dry upland so cereal crops by the era's standard was probably fine.

Stock on the moors and cliffs.
Grass meadows in the combes and hollows where there is water.

But it's almost certain that stock would have grazed the crop fields at some point as part of a crop rotation, you'd have thought.

It's fascinating!

Yes, I find it fascinating too.

Similar to the set up in most crofting townships round here, soil walls faced with stone facing only on the hill side, with the whole townships stock kept on hill through the growing season then let down onto the in-bye through winter.

Many townships have routes with two walls leading from the hill through the in-bye the same as you described, used for taking the house cows to and from the hill daily, often the job of the children- as was told to me by a lady now deceased but had the job herself as a child.
 

egbert

Member
Livestock Farmer
That's basically what dad thinks the walls were designed as, keeping stock from crops.
water for stock in most fields would have been a issue pre- pipes, so you have to wonder if cropping (cereals?) was favoured, we're dry upland so cereal crops by the era's standard was probably fine.

Stock on the moors and cliffs.
Grass meadows in the combes and hollows where there is water.

But it's almost certain that stock would have grazed the crop fields at some point as part of a crop rotation, you'd have thought.

It's fascinating!
Yes, I find it fascinating too.

Similar to the set up in most crofting townships round here, soil walls faced with stone facing only on the hill side, with the whole townships stock kept on hill through the growing season then let down onto the in-bye through winter.

Many townships have routes with two walls leading from the hill through the in-bye the same as you described, used for taking the house cows to and from the hill daily, often the job of the children- as was told to me by a lady now deceased but had the job herself as a child.


and now we're getting into it....
on Dartmoor, most major steadings, up to all hamlets, had walled tracks up to the 'common' or rough, called 'drift lanes...for obvious reason.
Ours is laid out - and I still use it every day- so 1 man cannot work it. It was very clearly a 2 man system or more.

And we've little threshing barns all the way up through the valley, signalling everyone grew a little corn. One on our place is tiny, with the platt above (where you'd stack your stooks?) barely 40' across, waiting for a dry autumn day to pitch em in. That one might only have handled crop off 4-8 acres.
No Tescos then!
 

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