Grass

[cross_7]

I know there isn't an answer to my question but I'm going to ask anyway

On a previous topic we discussed summer stockers, nutrition, gain and etc
The guy I spoke with says he's getting 1.8# on bluestem(not sure the variety)
I have very little experience with Bermuda and someone said(novatech maybe) that stockers don't do well on it unless the fertilizer is poured to it.
The kleingrass I have the cows get fat on it until it gets mature then drops off
The kr bluestem is the last thing they eat so it may not work for light stockers.
I have no experience with any other except native and it serves a purpose just not this one.

What would be the recommended grass for summer stockers in the hot dry southwest that has good nutrition spring/summer and that will put weight on 4wt calves ?

 

[BC]

Cross7, typically with Bermuda we get a little over 1 lb a day adg without any supplement. With 2 lbs soybean meal or cottonseed meal and 2 lbs corn you can get 2 lbs adg. Tifton 85 got 2 lbs adg with out supplement and nearly 3 lbs with the same supplement that got 2 lbs on coastal.

One thing you might look into is going to a paddock system with the stockers. Several of the dairies in my area use a high density, frequent rotation system to keep grass quality high. Kind of like using the cattle to mow the grass and the regrowth in 16 to 20 days is young , tender and higher quality. This might work to get you better gains without supplementation.

 

[cross_7]

Cross7, typically with Bermuda we get a little over 1 lb a day adg without any supplement. With 2 lbs soybean meal or cottonseed meal and 2 lbs corn you can get 2 lbs adg. Tifton 85 got 2 lbs adg with out supplement and nearly 3 lbs with the same supplement that got 2 lbs on coastal.

One thing you might look into is going to a paddock system with the stockers. Several of the dairies in my area use a high density, frequent rotation system to keep grass quality high. Kind of like using the cattle to mow the grass and the regrowth in 16 to 20 days is young , tender and higher quality. This might work to get you better gains without supplementation.

There is a place listed that has some coastal and some cultivated I'm interested
I was thinking about tifton 85 on the cultivated
We can't agree on a price but in my search I think I can buy farm ground cheaper than pasture
So starting from scratch I could go ant direction
The only thing that concerns me with bermuda is the lack of rain and fertilizer needs

 

[Jogeephus]

Don't know all the forages you can grow in Texas but if you are starting from scratch you might want to think about diversifying your forages based on their yields and the timing of the yield. Tift 85 is good stuff but like you say its a hungry plant and can break you on fertilizer if you over do it which is all the more reason you should plan your diversification. Here is some food for thought. Tift 85 will produce around 17000 lbs of highly nutritious forage in 4-5 months whereas Bahia will produce about the same of moderate quality forage but it takes it about 8-9 months to do so. Tift 85 has a bunch of dead space between each mother plant which provides a much better seed bed for other more cool weather forages so this gives you somewhere around 7 months that you can be growing something else.

Don't know if I'm explaining myself well but if you think about it I think you will see what I'm getting at.

BTW - with all the rain we've had I'm grazing around 3647/lbs of cattle per acre on some Tift 85 and it looks like I will still have to cut it for hay.

 

[Texas PaPaw]

I have coastal and hate it for stockers but it is what the place had when we bought it. Have heard good things about some of the old world bluestems and they can produce without fertilizer. Like BC says, coastal gains are not good without supplement. Have found it more profitable to grow stockers without coastal pasture, just feeding a byproduct mix of corn gluten, soy hulls and cottonseed hulls. Plus the grass/fertilizer combo is totally rain dependent, whereas the feed truck can run rain or shine. This allowed me to buy cheap stockers in the summer of 2011 when no one had grass and other times when the price is right.

Just another 2 cents worth.

 

[bird dog]

You may want to look at WW B-Dahl if you are starting from scratch. I am not sure how stockers will do but cows so really well on it and it requires very little in input costs. Another advantage is that fire ants don't seem to like it.