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Cattle Boards
Grasses, Pastures & Hay
Is fertilizing even needed?
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<blockquote data-quote="hawkeye78" data-source="post: 1024914" data-attributes="member: 20491"><p>I was told by an elder that the amount of roots is directly related to the amount of above ground growth. If its short you have no root structure. If you take half and leave half it will come back faster. So if you mow your yard really short it will take longer to regrow and it will also die off first when gets dry or even winter kill. Horses don't bite the grass off they pull it off so they are taking it off short or even pulling the roots out of the ground. </p><p></p><p>As far as fertilizing or not. If it hasn't had anything for a few years I would first take a soil test and see how much OM is there. Then I would take a spade and dig a foot by foot by foot of soil and put into a tub and count the number of earthworms in that cubic foot of soil the more you have the healthier your soil is and the less you will have to put on it. If you are going to hay it you need to feed the hay back on it to put nutrients back. It is also a good idea to not take hay off of the same field continuously. It works better if you can take hay off then stockpile for winter grazing and graze rotationally for the next 4 years then go back to hay it again. This way you will be putting urine, manure, and leftover grass back into the soil to feed the microbes. One easy way to feed the microbes is to thinly spread some dry molasses or some corn meal on the ground this will give the microbes food to turn into carbohydrates to live on. :mrgreen: :idea:</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="hawkeye78, post: 1024914, member: 20491"] I was told by an elder that the amount of roots is directly related to the amount of above ground growth. If its short you have no root structure. If you take half and leave half it will come back faster. So if you mow your yard really short it will take longer to regrow and it will also die off first when gets dry or even winter kill. Horses don't bite the grass off they pull it off so they are taking it off short or even pulling the roots out of the ground. As far as fertilizing or not. If it hasn't had anything for a few years I would first take a soil test and see how much OM is there. Then I would take a spade and dig a foot by foot by foot of soil and put into a tub and count the number of earthworms in that cubic foot of soil the more you have the healthier your soil is and the less you will have to put on it. If you are going to hay it you need to feed the hay back on it to put nutrients back. It is also a good idea to not take hay off of the same field continuously. It works better if you can take hay off then stockpile for winter grazing and graze rotationally for the next 4 years then go back to hay it again. This way you will be putting urine, manure, and leftover grass back into the soil to feed the microbes. One easy way to feed the microbes is to thinly spread some dry molasses or some corn meal on the ground this will give the microbes food to turn into carbohydrates to live on. :mrgreen: :idea: [/QUOTE]
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Is fertilizing even needed?
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