GRAZING A GRAIN CROP TO FEED LAMBING EWES.

Who achieves the most “financial “benefit?

There are 5 segments to this task, which is quite common in our district.

1. The Land. 2. The sheep. 3. The farmer. 4. The inputs required. 5 .Your rural supply store.

Generally speaking you take a perfectly good pasture paddock and you undertake one of the following tasks. You plough/disc to produce a suitable seed-bed or you spray it out leaving a “nueatulear wasteland”. Not only do you “destroy “a perfectly good pasture, but you destroy all that is below ground which makes a soil “healthy”.

Now I am unaware of “any crop” which delivers a healthy outcome supplying all of the mineral/trace elements of the milking ewe. To compensate for this shortfall the ewe instead calls on her own “reserves” to make up for the short-fall, thus making her vulnerable to any challenge by disease or parasites. At 10 days the lamb start to pick at green feed (if available) at the direction of the mother. In simple terms this is the start of “generation to generation transfer” of knowledge which resides in the flock and over time (if permitted) the flock will train the next generation in the necessary skills for them to perform at their maximum over their lifetime and in turn “train” their own lambs. There is an accepted recipe for mineral supplementation, but in reality it fails to compensate for all of the “shortfalls “that appear.

The farmer invests a lot of time, energy, diesel and wear and tear on machinery to set the grain crop up.

There are a number of steps which require the farmer to complete. Seed bed(we have already discussed),purchased seed (usually lime coated in our area because of high acidity),fertilizer which all modern grains seem to need and various weed sprays as modern seed “resent” any competition. Usually ‘dry sown “if you hit a dry spell, you can be behind the 8 ball from the “get-go”.

So who are the “losers” to this point and who are the winners? Winners are pretty obvious, the various companies who supply inputs, the rural supply store, the local fuel merchant and the local machinery dealer. The losers are generally speaking are, the land and the sheep and of course the farmer who is the “risk taker” in the equation.

So is the answer to confine the stock and hand feed? Maybe it’s about lambing when the pasture “growth “cycle begins and work within the lands “limits” to produce a smaller number of higher quality at a far reduced COP (Cost Of Production).I will leave the answers to these questions to the reader to think about and to arrive at the best solution for their farm.

I look forward to the groups "views" on the topic.....T.O.R.

I'm completely with you. However, I'm also curious as to what others will say.

I have 3 acres so the situation is, as always, different. We hand-seed crops into areas of the pasture that have been made bare by the chickens or dogs--usually a mix of annual legumes, squashes, grains, and grasses. And we frost seed a perennial grass/legume combination each year as well. On a large scale, it's harder to hand-seed, but one could still focus on improving perennial pastures rather than using an annual, cultivated monoculture or diculture to feed ewes.

We have had our place 2 1/2 years. We just finished fencing in the last remaining section and the sheep are on it right now. Our soil is sugar sand, and I planted winter rye on it for 2 winters. In the new section, the rye died back and added humus to the sand. We have mounds of wood chip mulch that is composting and much of it will be spread over our "pastures" for the humus so desperately needed. LOL I use the word pasture to describe any dirt around here that is fenced in. I have 4 pigs in one pasture, they have rooted up weeds, briars and done a good job of plowing it up. After they go to freezer camp, I'll smooth it out and plant mixed grasses and forbs. I sprigged Bermuda grass in a few places last fall and surprisingly, a lot of it is surviving the pigs.

I believe the winner is the farmer with good pasture, not a mono culture, but mixed grasses and forbs. The winner is the one who keeps inputs low and manages his/her land properly.

The Old Ram-Australia said:

Who achieves the most “financial “benefit?

There are 5 segments to this task, which is quite common in our district.

1. The Land. 2. The sheep. 3. The farmer. 4. The inputs required. 5 .Your rural supply store.

Generally speaking you take a perfectly good pasture paddock and you undertake one of the following tasks. You plough/disc to produce a suitable seed-bed or you spray it out leaving a “nueatulear wasteland”. Not only do you “destroy “a perfectly good pasture, but you destroy all that is below ground which makes a soil “healthy”.

I use no poisons on our land. None.

Now I am unaware of “any crop” which delivers a healthy outcome supplying all of the mineral/trace elements of the milking ewe. To compensate for this shortfall the ewe instead calls on her own “reserves” to make up for the short-fall, thus making her vulnerable to any challenge by disease or parasites. At 10 days the lamb start to pick at green feed (if available) at the direction of the mother. In simple terms this is the start of “generation to generation transfer” of knowledge which resides in the flock and over time (if permitted) the flock will train the next generation in the necessary skills for them to perform at their maximum over their lifetime and in turn “train” their own lambs. There is an accepted recipe for mineral supplementation, but in reality it fails to compensate for all of the “shortfalls “that appear.

My sheep have free mineral choice, but I agree, there is none that supplies ALL that they need. That is another reason why I will not plow up the soil or poison everything and start over with a mono crop. I watch them eat "weeds" with gusto. That goes against the almost religious mantra that everything must be eliminated except for the Bermuda, Bahia or other grass of choice. Why are they eating the weeds? It must be because the weed roots go to deeper levels of the soil and bring up various minerals that are not in the shallower levels. Different plants = different nutrients. As I improve the soil around here, my amendments are not petroleum based fertilizer salts which are severely lacking necessary trace minerals. The only bought fertilizers are lime and azomite, a rock dust from an ancient lava flow which has many of the trace minerals needed. Animal manures, cover crops and the composting piles of ramial wood chips are the way I have chosen to improve the soil.

The farmer invests a lot of time, energy, diesel and wear and tear on machinery to set the grain crop up.

There are a number of steps which require the farmer to complete. Seed bed(we have already discussed),purchased seed (usually lime coated in our area because of high acidity),fertilizer which all modern grains seem to need and various weed sprays as modern seed “resent” any competition. Usually ‘dry sown “if you hit a dry spell, you can be behind the 8 ball from the “get-go”.

Yes, I will purchase seeds, but they will not be only one type of grass. I plan on sowing various herbs, weeds, grasses(winter and summer types). I have tried to plant grass seeds, but because of the lack of humus in the soil, when the sun gets scorching hot, the sand heats up and cooks the new roots struggling to survive. If I add fertilizer salts to the mix, it only further burns the soil. The composting wood chips will add the needed humus which will help to shade the roots and hold moisture.

So who are the “losers” to this point and who are the winners? Winners are pretty obvious, the various companies who supply inputs, the rural supply store, the local fuel merchant and the local machinery dealer. The losers are generally speaking are, the land and the sheep and of course the farmer who is the “risk taker” in the equation.

So is the answer to confine the stock and hand feed? Maybe it’s about lambing when the pasture “growth “cycle begins and work within the lands “limits” to produce a smaller number of higher quality at a far reduced COP (Cost Of Production).I will leave the answers to these questions to the reader to think about and to arrive at the best solution for their farm.

I look forward to the groups "views" on the topic.....T.O.R.

Click to expand...

(click expand to see my replies) As always, T.O.R. Good discussion and I appreciate your efforts to help us newbies.

I have been buying feed and round bales of hay. My soil is sand, the grasses and forbs are sparse, we've not been able to utilize all of our land because it was not all fenced in, but NOW IT IS! I am just fine with having less sheep and reduced Cost Of Production, but I sure don't feel like a "winner" at this stage of the game.

The Old Ram-Australia said:

Generally speaking you take a perfectly good pasture paddock and you undertake one of the following tasks. You plough/disc to produce a suitable seed-bed or you spray it out leaving a “nueatulear wasteland”. Not only do you “destroy “a perfectly good pasture, but you destroy all that is below ground which makes a soil “healthy”.

Click to expand...

(preface by saying I'm not sure what 'nueatulear' means)
If you mean a complete chemical burndown (ie- herbicide Glyphosate+ residual soil active chemical/pre-emergent herbicide added) I don't know of anyone that does that in my area, regardless of what species they are raising or what crop/forage they intend to sow and have only rarely seen or heard of anyone even using Glyphosate (foliar action with no residual soil activity) on a pasture.

Some folks do use herbicides such as Grazon Next which uses foliar action to kill existing broadleaf plants, but also has an additional chemical with a known amount of residual action, but it has not been shown to affect most grasses emerging from the natural seedbank.
It works well, but don't plan on planting any legumes the same year you spray for weeds with Grazon.

Lime coated seeds here are rarely used, tho they have been around a long time. The coating does have some positive effect on correcting the soil immediately adjacent (just a few milimeters at best) to the germinating seedling, but most studies point to the fact that the coating aids in water absorbency thru wicking more than a move toward a neutral or alkaline scale. Some studies have reflected that coated seed results, especially in lime coating are higher, simply because the coated seeds have a higher flow rate out of the seeder or planter than uncoated seeds, (coated seeds are heavier, thus flow at a higher rate) which means more seeds sown per sq ft, giving the impression that the coated seed test plots had better performance than those using uncoated seeds.

Getting the soil's pH correct first will go a long way toward ridding a pasture or prospective pasture of weeds and undesirable plants.

There are instances where dry lotting animals can get a ROI, but it is very very difficult to pencil out on any small scale and you have to keep a very close eye on the market prices in your area, feed costs, and as always, a higher risk of parasitic problems in a confined space, especially in wet years.

Drought years affect us all. Along with natural grasses and introduced grasses and legumes, the undesirables (weeds and invasives) have their own presence in the seedbank as well, and many of those seeds are extremely long lived, and can lie dormant for years, just waiting for the right conditions to germinate and emerge. Anyone living in or traveling thru Texas in 2010-2012 saw the results of this, as previously lush green permanent pastures of bahia, coastal, Tif and even fescue were suddenly replaced by tens of thousands of acres of wolley croton (goatweed). Even the roadsides and between the divided highways were solid with these weeds. (not surprising too, that the whitewing dove population exploded those same years) Wooley Croton seeds have been shown to lie dormant but remain viable in the soil 7-10 years.

Baymule:
I'll be more than happy to ship you a 1lb coffee can of Chinese Tallow seeds to plant with your mix, and watch to see how long it takes for you to decide 'all natural' protocols won't work.
Like the old Lays potato chip commercial, when it comes to Tallow trees, "No one can have just one"

I also don't know anyone who does a complete plowing or herbicide spraying on a pasture. I do know people who will spot-spray especially invasive or toxic plants (like poison hemlock). People also commonly apply herbicide to fencelines to keep vegetation down there. I prefer physical control, which is more feasable on a small acreage.

When I moved to my 6 acres, it was said to have been hayfield at one time, then it was 'back yard' for a long time, and only partly mowed. There were some 'hay' grasses (orchardgrass and timothy), but if it had been a hayfield, that was decades ago, going by the size of the trees that were taking over the property. There were also numerous multiflora rose, wild grapevine, poison ivy, and small trees and brush of all kinds.

I started from scratch - fencing in a small area, then clearing to expand the fenceline. I only had ponies at first, then added sheep two years later, with the thought that sheep would help clear the underbrush - which has worked well. My plan was to start with what's here, and improve from there. As with @Baymule, I do not want a monoculture, and neither do the sheep. They relish the brush, vines, trees and weeds, and as Baymule said, many of those send roots far deeper than grasses can, pulling up different nutrients from different levels of the soil.

I have one large 'main pasture', and a few smaller paddocks. There are two paddocks by the sheep's run-in, and the ponies are rarely allowed in those. My sheep don't overgraze like the ponies do, so their pastures are lush and green. There isn't much brush, but the forage is a mix of grass and 'weeds' - clover, narrow and broad-leaved plantain, dandelion, wild carrot, etc. There are a few weeds they don't eat, and it's not too hard to remove those by hand at the most effective time.

I also let the sheep into the main pasture, and they've eaten and helped kill a lot of the multiflora rose and other underbrush. I'm gradually clearing trees (letting the sheep eat the safe ones as I cut them down), so enough sunlight can get to the ground and allow more grasses and weeds to grow. I have not seeded anything yet, but if I do it will be with things like chicory, wild lettuce, lamb's quarters, and other things the sheep and ponies will love to eat. I'm also leaving quite a few trees, primarily the ones the sheep eat, including maple, oak and apple. Many of these will be used as a 'second forage' for the sheep, cutting branches off for them to eat, similar to pollarding.

I have a perimeter fencing project in progress for this summer, and once that's done I plan to construct 'cells' along the fencelines that I can close off to the ponies (some of the sheep may get into them) and open them on a rotating basis. Combined with continued clearing, this should improve my pasture a lot. More cross-grazing with the sheep and ponies should also help with parasite control. It may also help with feed costs, too, but my feed costs aren't horrible, and some of the ewes get extra because I milk them.

Who benefits with this? I think I do, the land does, and the sheep and ponies do, too. So do my customers, who tell me how good my lamb is. Not all benefits are financial.

Who loses? Well, the equipment, fuel, herbicide and seed sellers aren't really losing, I wasn't buying their stuff anyway. I do use a couple chainsaws and mower.

It does take time, energy and planning to improve a pasture this way, but improving a pasture even with chemicals takes time and energy and planning. But I am also getting to know my pasture very well. I've identified a lot of plants, and there are many more to go. I watch the sheep, to see what plants they eat, and when (some plants are more likely to be eaten at certain times of the year). I think this route is more sustainable, more healthy for the land, and for us, it's working.

G'day Graybeard,sorry about the "spelling".I should have checked my dictionary instead of just relying on "spellcheck".should have read "nuclear".This form of soil treatment is quite common in many cropping areas down here,its usually a pre-curser to a direct drilling of grain crops.However it is still used by some livestock producers in an effort to "fill a feed gap" in winter,due to the fact they lamb outside in late Fall as lambing later will interfere with other tasks on the farm like when their shearing contractors come,rather than early spring as they try to catch the early market in the run-up to Xmas.

We are perhaps a little more fortunate as I can still "shear" our flock at a time of my choosing (I'm almost 75 and the flock is about 250 head) and I have learned over the years that the best prices are gained for suitable lambs/mutton is the early winter period.

When I post a topic ,the aim is to get the group to "think" about the reason they undertake certain actions and wether there may be an alternative much "kinder" to the environment, in writing I never expect everyone to "agree' with my sentiments, but to generate discussion on the topic "for or against",I don't care......T.O.R.

greybeard said:

Baymule:
I'll be more than happy to ship you a 1lb coffee can of Chinese Tallow seeds to plant with your mix, and watch to see how long it takes for you to decide 'all natural' protocols won't work.
Like the old Lays potato chip commercial, when it comes to Tallow trees, "No one can have just one"

Click to expand...

I am more than well acquainted with Chinese Tallow trees. I must admit to using Remedy to kill them on the land we had in Livingston-and they still sprouted from the roots. I hate them. I loathe them. Thanks for the kind offer, but we moved away from the damned things.

The Old Ram-Australia said:

G'day Graybeard,sorry about the "spelling".I should have checked my dictionary instead of just relying on "spellcheck".should have read "nuclear".

Click to expand...

Ahh, I didn't make that connection...thought it to be a case of a common language separating us, as English speaking people in different parts of the world often use different words to describe the same thing, but I wasn't sure what that 'thing' was.

The Old Ram-Australia said:

When I post a topic ,the aim is to get the group to "think" about the reason they undertake certain actions and wether there may be an alternative much "kinder" to the environment, in writing I never expect everyone to "agree' with my sentiments, but to generate discussion on the topic "for or against",I don't care......T.O.R.

Click to expand...

I am the same way. Don't care much for idle banter, but I will engage in thought provoking conversations at the drop of a hat, and if my opinion rankles or is wrong, it doesn't bother me much what form the rebuttal takes or how intense it is. As Nifty once encouraged: "ie, have a thick skin when reading and be very friendly and clear when posting"

My skin is pretty thick after all these decades, and I'm quite comfortable in it.