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Grass fed workshops….
….our friend Ridge Shinn will be holding a grass fed cattle workshop this Saturday, May 11th, at Hardwick, Massachusetts. The day-long session will includes a wide range of topics including selecting, breeding and managing cattle for the grass fed beef market. Here’s the registration form: http://www.nofamass.org/events/raising-100-grass-fed-beef#.UYi-oLVwrSh Sorry we can’t attend but we’ll be in Missouri for Greg Judy’s mob grazing workship with Ian Mitchell-Innes.
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Throwback at Trapper Creek….
….is a very informative website we found recently. It details the “adventures” of Nita Wilson, a third generation farmer in the Pacific Northwest. She spends a good deal of time on each topic she develops; her treatment of beginning rotational grazing in the spring is an example of her work. http://matronofhusbandry.wordpress.com/2013/04/10/its-complicated/ It’s worth your time to check out the entire site.
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Worth waiting for….
….the second pass over the new grass and we’re still moving them quickly. The plan is to cover every pasture (but one) within 21 days. The “one” is our Italian rye pasture, intended for the steers but they didn’t get the memo. We put the steers on the “special” grass earlier this week. By the end of the next day, they had found their way through to wire fences and across a creek to re-join the main herd. I can hear Ian saying: “Of course, dummy.” Maybe there’s a book in that: Grazing for Dummies. But I’m a fast learner, the next time the rotation takes the herd to the Italian rye,…
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A familiar scene….
….if you’ve ever tried to spray fish oil. Add in several other ingredients, and you have a recipe for a sprayer jam. We’re fortunate to have a neighbor—Ira McDowell—who is a veteran tractor mechanic as well as an all-around handyman. That’s Ira unclogging the line from the outlet of the PTO pump while I “supervise”. The material we’re spraying is a combination of fish oil and compost tea laced with microbes, calcium and phosphate. It’s an expensive mixture and we’re trying it on two test pastures. The hope is that this potent mixture…after several applications…will fix our pastures with a fertility profile they haven’t seen in hundreds of years. It’s…
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Dessert….
….the main herd has now been moved from the last of the stockpiled grass and getting their taste of the “green stuff”. It’s so good, they don’t stop even when you stand right over them…certainly not when you take their picture. Ironically, this could be the first time they’ll actually need hay. Too green grass goes right through them. But there is enough dried grass mixed in that I suspect it may not be a problem. What we do now is just let them get the top inch or two and then move them….top all the pastures quickly and then they’ll return here in 45 days and take up a…
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And so it begins….
….tomorrow, with our main herd of mama cows, calves and steers moving from the last of this stockpiled grass into the pastures that will be their home through the spring and early summer. Not quite mob grazing…we’ll be putting only about 75,000 pounds pressure per acre…less if we think it’s wise along the way. And we’ll be moving them very fast at first….at least fast for us. Daily. There is considerable debate among cattlemen about when to turn out cattle….recommendations range from “first green” to 10 inches. We are agnostic on this and just do what feels right. This evening, after about five days of very warm temperatures and some…
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Spring is in the air….
…37 degree air, but nevertheless. At Thistle Hill we decided today to declare Spring has arrived. We announced the news this morning to a line-up of our young bulls. That means some new assignments. For instance, Green Field, winter home for ease of taking care of our young bulls, is now reduced to six. Their buddies have been detached for duty at satellite pastures about 5 miles away. One bull is already on the job, breeding some young heifers for a farm in South Carolina. And another will be sent to still another satellite pasture to romance another group of heifers. Despite the temperature, green has begun to show in…
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What a difference a day makes….
….less than 48 hours after planting our Italian ryegrass on a sunny and warm Spring day, this was the scene that greeted us this morning. Five inches of snow. Not only beautiful but perfect for the seed snuggled below. Hopefully, the borderline freezing temperatures will mean a slow melt for the next few days. That’s much better than a washing rain. Our “experiment” is off to a perfect start.
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Just in time for the snow….
….please. On his last visit, pasture guru Jim Gerrish had recommended we try seeding some Italian rye grass into one of our pastures and here we go. A beautiful early Spring morning; hard to believe 8 inches of snow is on the way. But that’s perfect for new seeds. I sometimes think we should call this “Thistle Hill Experimental Farm” for all the things we try. But it is part of the fun. For our non-farm readers, we’re towing a “drill”. A row of blades cuts grooves in the sod and seed is carefully metered into the grooves. Rollers then pass over the seed, covering the hole. The seed, the…
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Spring fever….
….a group of Thistle Hill yearling heifers camped out by the electric wire, convinced that the grass is indeed greener. They’ll have to wait a few more weeks, though, before we begin their rotation. Right now, they’re still being fed hay and a little beet pulp. In fact, the grass closest to the camera isn’t where they’ll really be going. We’ll start them farther out in the field, where we left a good supply of residual grass last fall. They’ll begin on the fresh grass right after the first of April and be back to this point about mid-May. We’ll also be starting the main herd across the road about the same…