The original poster was having trouble with his cows eating any hay because
they preferred grass to hay. .Most cows do. So what do you do when you
don't have enough grass for all the cows.
The answer is to limit the amount of grass offered. Then they will eat
the hay. The quality of the hay can be much lower than what would be
needed if there were no grass, but there are limits. The better the hay,
the better the performance of the animals. But it is a much better approach
than letting them eat all the grass first and then feeding them all of the
hay. I know that you know this, so I must assume that my original post was
not very clear. I hope I did better with this one.
Clay
----- Original Message -----
From: "F. W. Owen" <fwo@bright.net>
To: <graze-l@witt.ac.nz>
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 10:36 AM
Subject: [Graze-l] Re: Winter Grazing
* I have tried to supplement with hay to
* lengthen rotations and maintain gains during
* the summer as you just mentioned - - but have
* had limited intake unless I lock animals into
* a lot or sacrifice paddock. They seem to
* prefer walking about while taking short grass
* down farther, except during some fall
* periods... I assume the lush fall growth is
* just not as tasty. Do you have any tips on
* supplemental hay palitability or is there
* just no way to compete with grass?
and
* ...but the answer to your question is in your
* own e-mail. You must lock the animals into a
* lot or paddock. It doesn't have to be a
* sacrifice paddock though. If you put 100 cows
* into a 2 acre paddock, they will eat all the
* grass, then they will eat the hay. Then you
* move them to a fresh 2 acre paddock and
* repeat the process. Because they are not in
* any one paddock long enough to eat the
* regrowth, they don't hurt the grass. The
* palatability of the hay isn't much of an
* issue to what they will eat, but the quality
* of the hay will impact production. This
* technique is a wonderful way to ration high
* quality grass and supplement with low quality
* hay.
Hi,
I have doubts. My experience is here isn't quite as good as the responder
had
in MIssouri.
I would be happier if he had just left out the word "wonderful". If
he had
left it out, I would not have replied.
I'm pretty sure that the cows would anticipate the next day's paddock and
decline too much of the hay opportunity.
You could, of course, force them to eat it, but it's hard to be that
resolute
with your hands on slack udders at milking time.
Unlike the responder above, I think the palatability of the hay would be a
fairly significant issue if this plan were to work.
However, I think it would work with balage, some of the cows would eat that
before they grazed the grass.
--
Kindest regards,
========================
F. W. Owen
Owenlea Holsteins
9430 Spencer Road
Homerville, Ohio 44235
e-mail fwo@bright.net
home page http://www.bright.net/~fwo
voice & fax 330.625.2369
cell 330.635.2287
========================
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