Written By: Matt Poore, Seth Nagy, Dale Monks, Miguel Castillo, NCSU Cooperative Extension
Pasture Management
Stocking rate. During a drought is a good time to evaluate a farmer’s stocking
rate. If pastures are overgrazed and farmers are feeding hay now it is likely because
they are overstocked. Many farmers would benefit from reducing their stocking rate.
They should consider culling unproductive, old or otherwise defective animals while prices are high.
Grazing management
During drought, continuously grazed fields will quickly
become overgrazed and unproductive. In a rotational grazing system animals are
moved through pastures utilizing available forage until no pasture is ready for grazing.
At that time animals are managed in a sacrifice area where they are fed hay. Once
rains return well rested pastures will recover rapidly while overgrazed pastures will not. In continuous grazing systems animals pastures need to be carefully monitored and if close grazing occurs they need to be removed until grass is above the minimum height to graze. The importance of grazing management during a drought can’t be overemphasized.
Forage growth and regrowth will be slower during drought. Hence, adequate
management of grazing will require extra care to balance the amount of forage available in the pasture and the amount of forage needed by the grazing livestock. In order to prevent overgrazing, remove livestock from pastures once the forage has been grazed off to the recommended heights. Guidelines to heights start and stop grazing different types of pasture are provided in AG-939: https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/pasture-grazing-heights-for-rotational-stocking. Because of the drought, expect much longer rest periods wiil be needed before another grazing event. If pastures are continuously stocked, consider removing livestock (just like when stocked rotationally) once the pastures have reached the minimum height.
Harvested forage management.
It is critical that farmers plan for their winter hay supply given many are currently feeding their winter hay. Producers should do a feed inventory of their hay and any standing pasture biomass available to determine the possibility of future feed needs. Hay should be sampled for nutrients and nitrate so it can be fed in a balanced ration. Corn silage should be sampled for nutrients and nitratefor ration balancing as well. Drought damaged corn silage is usually higher in moisture and protein than you might expect. Knowing the nutritive value of all your harvested feeds will allow you to allocate the best hay or silage to the groups that have the highest requirements. |