Why not livestock in your rotation?

[The Ruminant]

The potential benefits of livestock in an arable rotation are well documented - good blackgrass control, reduced fertiliser usage, increased soil health, drainage and fertility. But we all face lots of obstacles when thinking about bringing livestock back into the rotation.

If you're all arable/cropping, have you considered it and what are the main reasons you don't have livestock on your farm?

I'm also interested in those who have reintroduced livestock - what obstacles did you have to overcome, have they been so great that you've stopped keeping livestock or are you still persisting with them?

(Livestock can mean cattle, sheep, pigs, poultry etc)

 

[S J H]

The potential benefits of livestock in an arable rotation are well documented - good blackgrass control, reduced fertiliser usage, increased soil health, drainage and fertility. But we all face lots of obstacles when thinking about bringing livestock back into the rotation.

If you're all arable/cropping, have you considered it and what are the main reasons you don't have livestock on your farm?

I'm also interested in those who have reintroduced livestock - what obstacles did you have to overcome, have they been so great that you've stopped keeping livestock or are you still persisting with them?

(Livestock can mean cattle, sheep, pigs, poultry etc)

I'm not saying this as a fencing contractor, because it wouldn't do me any good, and I have enough work.

But I'd have thought instead having grants on equipment, we'd be better off fencing arable land for use in a rotation.

I know we can electric fence, but I think it puts a lot of arable farmers off, thinking they'll be much more risk involved.

 

[Oscar]

TB is the big problem here. I would love to get cattle back but the wild red deer are riddle with it , got black and white stripes also with a landlord who will not allow us to be in the cull so would create more work ,cost and risk unfortunately.

 

[farmerm]

We have sheep on perm pasture too steep or too heavy to crop comfortably.. It would do our ground a lot of good to include a grass lay in the rotation elsewhere but that would mean having have more of the disappointing wooly things … Proper fencing an arable field for perhaps 5 grazing years in its life is a rather expensive luxury. Keeping an electric fencing standing here is a full time job, the local deer walk though hedges, the don't see the wire and end up dragging the whole lot across the field into a tangled mess. For those that don't have livestock already a good reason not to have them is your crops don't need checking on or escape whilst you are having some precious time away...

 

[The Ruminant]

TB is the big problem here. I would love to get cattle back but the wild red deer are riddle with it , got black and white stripes also with a landlord who will not allow us to be in the cull so would create more work ,cost and risk unfortunately.

What about other classes of livestock? Sheep, chickens etc? Would you consider these and if not, what are your main reasons?

 

[The Ruminant]

I'm not saying this as a fencing contractor, because it wouldn't do me any good, and I have enough work.

But I'd have thought instead having grants on equipment, we'd be better off fencing arable land for use in a rotation.

I know we can electric fence, but I think it puts a lot of arable farmers off, thinking they'll be much more risk involved.

I agree wholeheartedly. I think a ring fence round the outside of a block of land is all that's needed. Electric fences internally will suffice (especially - for cattle - a single strand of HT wire with wooden posts to keep it off the ground at 20-30m intervals, as this is much more deer-proof (see @farmerm 's post) and removable as and when you want to return the land to cropping.)

It's not the end of the world if the livestock get out of one part of the farm into another part - but it's essential that you sleep well at night knowing the livestock are well fenced in from the wider world

 

[S J H]

I agree wholeheartedly. I think a ring fence round the outside of a block of land is all that's needed. Electric fences internally will suffice (especially a single strand of HT wire with wooden posts to keep it off the ground at 20-30m intervals, as this is much more deer-proof (see @farmerm 's post) and removable as and when you want to return the land to cropping

Yes that would be a good idea, it would have to be looked at properly to work out The best value for money, rather than an agent drawing some lines on a map.

All Creo timber, and with a grant for hedging aswell, all to a good spec rather than the shite spec they use now for mid tier. It would last for generations.

 

[S J H]

We have sheep on perm pasture too steep or too heavy to crop comfortably.. It would do our ground a lot of good to include a grass lay in the rotation elsewhere but that would mean having have more of the disappointing wooly things … Proper fencing an arable field for perhaps 5 grazing years in its life is a rather expensive luxury. Keeping an electric fencing standing here is a full time job, the local deer walk though hedges, the don't see the wire and end up dragging the whole lot across the field into a tangled mess. For those that don't have livestock already a good reason not to have them is your crops don't need checking on or escape whilst you are having some precious time away...

It could be used for grazing a crop or volunteers before drilling though.

 

[lloyd]

Who's going to buy all these extra sheep and cattle?
Cattle trade is crap and the sheep trade if finely balanced.
Before foot and mouth there were too many sheep for the
market place.

 

[colhonk]

Livestock?? sounds like work to me, can`t be doing with that at my age.

 

[farmerm]

It could be used for grazing a crop or volunteers before drilling though.

Our ewes are doing this right now... . with next to nothing drilled, grazed volunteers might be the only crop I get to harvest off the arable fields! The high water in the brook is enough to keep them off the neighbours at this time of the moment !

 

[The Ruminant]

Livestock?? sounds like work to me, can`t be doing with that at my age.

That's exactly the type of response I'm looking for - a really valid and legitimate reason not to do it.

However, supposing someone else approached you and said they would happily own and manage the livestock, grazing your leys, so you would have no risk and no responsibility. Would you be open to that? (This is only asked in the interests of research - I'm not going to come knocking on your door if you say yes!!)

 

[colhonk]

Hmmmm,thats a sneaky catch me out kinda question. If sheep like rygrass-then it would not even need seeds sown

 

[The Ruminant]

Hmmmm,thats a sneaky catch me out kinda question. If sheep like rygrass-then it would not even need seeds sown

A sneaky 'catch you out' kind of question indeed which you successfully avoided answering!!
Was it a yes or a no?

 

[Tim G]

That's exactly the type of response I'm looking for - a really valid and legitimate reason not to do it.

However, supposing someone else approached you and said they would happily own and manage the livestock, grazing your leys, so you would have no risk and no responsibility. Would you be open to that? (This is only asked in the interests of research - I'm not going to come knocking on your door if you say yes!!)

It's an interesting question and one I've thought about before. We have done similar with our sheep, although on grass fields which were cut for silage/hay and the landowner wanted tidying up over winter, and saw a benefit to it the following year.
The trouble I'd see is that it would be like a muck for straw deal, one party would be worried that the other were getting more benefit than them and it then falls apart.

 

[PSQ]

"The cost of complexity" - having to have specialist livestock machinery and experienced labour 365 days a year.
By the time you total up the cost of feeder wagons, bedding machines, tractor hours, suitable shed space, bruiser, Ifor Williams stock box, silage operations, baling operations, changing loaders twice as often and the opportunity costs of the grass versus cropping and selling straw versus bedding.
Apart from some marginal soil gains, there's not a lot of incentive for livestock production in a fertile lowland situation when the mart price dictates that the market doesn't need any extra production.

 

[teslacoils]

For me:

Lack of skill.
Little desire for a "round the clock" job.
Digestate takes me up to my organic N limits, so little value to muck.
Uncertain / poor cashflow.

 

[Slick]

Dirty smelly things, who's going to be looking after them during the shooting/skiing season?

 

[colhonk]

My best crop is big white boxes on wheels,they take enough looking after, 7 days a week. so No,could not do with livestock as well. Although they may well be less taxing to look after.?

 

[teslacoils]

Put simply, I'm not prepared to invest anything in the farm that doesn't pay for itself in under 61 months.