A summer pasture can be a producer’s greatest resources for his cattle. When managed correctly it provides all of the nutrients your cattle need going into fall breeding season.
Utilizing it properly is necessary to the success and profitability for any rancher. Like any investment it requires the correct amount of work on your part to reach it’s full potential.
Managing pastures during summer, and other seasons, correctly can help to improve your bottom line. When your forages are performing at their optimum then you will not have to spend as much on supplements. As I have mentioned before supplement costs can reach as much as 70% of a ranch’s operating budget.
Principal #1: Make sure you use the correct stocking rate
Having healthy pastures won’t do you any good if you are running more cows than the land can provide for. Making sure that you have to right number of animals is very important. Overgrazing can reduce forage production by over half and can take several years of management to recover.
Determining your stocking rate requires a little more than just how many acres that you have. You will need to look at how much forage producing acres that you have. If you are curious about how you can figure that out I discussed that in a previous post Estimating your grazeable acres.
As I just mentioned the best way to determine your stocking rate is to look at your forage production output. Once you have to forage production you will need to look at what is the animal unit month, or AUM, of the cattle that you will be running. North Dakota State has an article that goes over all of this if you are interested.
Now I do caution that when you determine what your stocking rate is this year that does not mean that you are done with it forever. There are many different factors that can go into stocking rates and they all can fluctuate from year to year. Some of these factors are:
- Owner’s management goals and practices
- The species of the animals
- the class of the livestock
- Acres available for grazing
- Rainfall
- Topography
- The soil type
- Forage species composition as well as quality and palpability
- Livestock water available
Due to the many factors that go into determining you stocking rate flexibility and being able to adapt will be required in order to succeed. Having a back up plan probably wouldn’t hurt either to be honest.
Principle #2: Do not overgraze summer pasture
Now I will admit this kind of goes hand in hand with the 1st principle but please bear with me. The general rule of thumb is that you want to “take half and leave half”. What this means is that you will need to leave a certain amount of the forage when you move the cattle off of the pasture.
The general consensus is that you will want to move them on to the pasture when the grasses are 8″ tall and move them off when there is 4″ left. The reason for these heights is that when forages get taller than 8″ then tend to become more fibrous and provide less nutrition. And the 4″ mark comes from the fact that you need to leave enough of the forage so that it can regrow back faster.
The leaf area that remains after grazing provides the base for regrowth. Research has shown that leaving half the leaf area produces a minimal impact of the root system. Allowing the forages to be grazed lower that half can reduce forage production by up to 60%.
Cows are fairly picky when it comes to the forages that they eat, preferring the tender succulent ones. This is the possibility that they will not graze all of the forages evenly so you may have to go in and mow the grasses to keep them all at the same height.
This goes without saying but do not cheat on this principle during hot, dry spells.
Principle #3: Give the summer pasture enough rest
Giving your pastures enough time to rest and regrow is very important in summer pasture management. As you are rotating you must give pasture forages time to grow back to practical grazing height (the 8″ we were talking about).
You will need to determine the times to rotate based on the condition of the forages. This means that naturally the rotation will be slower during hot, dry periods.
The only way to increase the number of days that a pasture is rested is to increase the number of paddocks that will be used. You can either build new fences or if you are wanting to go the temporary route then you can use electric fencing to do the same thing.
But how do I know how many paddocks I will need?! The answer to that is with the formula :Days of rest needed divided by days of grazing +1.
Example: Let’s say that in time of year you are looking at it takes 15 days for grass to regrow from 4″ back to 8″. Also, let’s say that you will be keeping them in each paddock for 5 days. So to get the number you want you will do 15/5=3+1 or 4 paddocks.
Now let’s say that the weather gets drier (unlikely I know) and now it takes 35 days for the same pasture to regrow to 8″. The formula now is 35/5=7+1 or 8 paddocks to provide enough rest.
Just remember that when you are reducing the size of the paddocks it will also reduce the stocking rate that you can have.
Principle #4: Maintain observation of summer pasture
In order to ensure that your pastures are performing at their best you will need to keep an eye on them to look for any changes or problems. As you are doing this you can create a map for each pasture or paddock to visualize any trouble areas. These can be things like weed overgrowth, bare spots, or things like that.
What you are looking for during these observations is to make sure that your pastures are not being overgrazed. As has been mention many time overgrazing is bad for your pasture and forage health.
Compaction is another problem that can be costly to forage production. This can occur if your cattle are only hanging out and walking in part of the pasture. A way that you can remedy this is to move mineral or supplement feeders. This will encourage them to other areas.
While monitoring your summer pastures identify and write down any weeds that may be present. There is not much you can do to them during this time of year. But knowing which are there will help you know what steps to take to eliminate them in the spring.
Along with the weeds keep tabs on which forages are being grazed and which are not. This can tell you if their are any improvements you may need to make or which grass seeds you may need to plant later.
