Market Farming

[<wiediger AT msn.com>]

Errol,

 

Here's the difference:

 

When stockpiling, say, fescue, you take the cows off it in August.  It grows during the cooler days of fall, and is all vegetative, so is much better quality.  Then it is strip grazed during winter. Stockpiled fescue done correctly, is high in nutrients - very different from stemmy, overmature hay. Last year, we started feeding hay in early January, and only fed for about 100 days.  And, for the first time, fed them out on the pasture, carrying the hay to them each day.  They ate fewer bales, stayed much cleaner, and the manure stayed on the pasture where it could be used instead of us having to clean it from a "yard".

 

Paul and Alison Wiediger
Au Naturel Farm
http://aunaturelfarm.homestead.com

----- Original Message -----

From: Errol Castens

To: Market Farming

Sent: Monday, June 20, 2005 7:53 AM

Subject: [Market-farming] Winter foraging instead of haying

My uncle used to let his hayfield get desperately overmature before he'd cut it, because it created so much more volume, and it made him feel like he was accomplishing more. The resulting hay was of exceedingly poor quality, and the condition of his cows showed it all winter. (His explanation was, "Well, it beats a snowball.")

 

Maybe there's a logical difference, but can someone explain to me why stockpiling summer grazing for winter foraging would yield substantially better quality feed than my uncle's hay?

 

Blessings,

errol castens

Oxford, Mississippi