At least for my cow, I manage the pasture in an intensive method based on the Voisin method, which is similar to the New Zealand style. In the USA the normal way of pasturing animals, especially cattle, is to fence the perimeter of a field and toss the cows out from beginning till end. But what happens is that the animals graze only their favorite plants and spend most of their time moving from place to place and the pasture quickly becomes degraded. That's usually the reason for the need to reseed every 3-5 years. What I am doing is to strictly limit the area of grazing to a good area for a short period of time. This means that area gets mowed down nice and low, then I move the animal to the next area which has had longer to grow and so contains more nutritional value. This whole system is a lot of work as I'm moving some animals every day or sometimes twice a day. It is a lot of work, but it means I have control over how the pasture gets eaten and I have a very good idea of its condition. So far, I'm liking it very much, other than the amount of time it takes (which might go down a bit over time as I work out the kinks in my implementation). Comet doesn't seem to be complaining, so long as I move her promptly when the time comes. To see more about how I do this check out this video I shot yesterday that shows what a mowed paddock and a fresh paddock look like: |
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How I manage pastureposted Apr 7, 2012, 4:56 PM by Gord Welch |