In my opinion, grazing through the winter for the sake of grazing through
the winter is not a good idea. We graze through the winter because it
costs less to do it that way. In places closer to the North Pole, it may
actually be more expensive to graze all winter, or even to maximize winter
grazing.
There is a reason that most of the beef cows are in the Southern or
Western part of the US. Unless you are going for a local niche market, I
would recommend selling the cows and getting something more appropriate to
your climate, like sheep. Sheep are much better at winter grazing than
cows. They should also be a good niche market.
Clay
MO Ozarks
----- Original Message -----
From: "gene schriefer" <sheepfarm@charter.net>
To: <graze-l@witt.ac.nz>
Sent: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 5:13 PM
Subject: RE: wintering vs. summering
>
>
>>> Our best forage
>>> to stockpiling under snow or into winter is tall fescue, perhaps meadow
>>> fescue would stockpile well also, but don't have enough experience with
>>> that.
>
>> --------------I've yet to meet a tall fescue I like here in WI. The
>> promises of "soft-leaved" TF are exagerated, to say the least. Yes,
> cattle
>> will eat stuff if they absolutely have no alternatives but critter
>> performance suffers.
>
>> And you're devoting valuable real estate to growing TF when there are far
>> more productive cool season grasses. (I'm not going to say that others
>> should not find merit in TF but our pasture walk group's experiences
> aren't
>> positive on TF for cattle).
>
> Our experiences are very different. Both cattle and sheep prefer the
> Barolex TF over low alkaloid Reed Canary grass at all stages.
> Orchard and brome are indeed more palatible, given the choice. Our TF
> orginally was seeded with alfalfa, as that played out I've now established
> some Kopu II in it. Yield wise, TF is pretty darn close to the RCG but
> they consume much more of the TF hay.
> Smooth brome and orchard are behind this in yield. I've yet to lose any
> TF
> to winter kill but routinely lose orchardgrass, never lost smooth brome.
> I
> haven't seen any rust on the TF, but do on the orchard grass.
>
> Through fall and winter TF loses the least quality left in the field.
>
> If your going to try grazing through winter, TF is going to be part of the
> mix.
>
> Gene Schriefer
> Shepherd
> Dodgeville, Wisconsin USA
> Commercial Texel-x and Charollais-x Sheep
> Red Poll Cattle
>
>
>
>
>
>
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