No Fertilizer

[Bluestem]

The Alfalfa,Red clover post got me thinking. A lot of information out there. Most of it seems to tell you, in so many words, that you need to spend a lot of money on your pastures to get such and such yields. I met a gentleman who hays over 1000 acres, close to 2000 I'm thinking. It has been in his family since the 1880's. They started out supplying the Army with hay. It has been hayed every year since that time. Little to no inputs. Which shows me- With properly functioning soil and careful management, you don't need a lot of expensive inputs.
I have set his field as my goal. Though I won't get there in my life time, the next guy will be a little closer.
There is a good article in the September issue of National Geographic on soil health. Give it a read if you get a chance.

 

[Jogeephus]

Bluestem, in all sincerity I would like it very much to have a neighbor such as yourself to compare different outside the box experiments with. While I do think it possible to have a zero input cattle operation I do not think this would be economically possible in my situation. That said, I think there are many things one can do to enhance forage growth while reducing costs. Your post mentions pastures. I agree that you can have good pastures with little input or no input costs in most years but I do not think you can do this with hay ground. Grazing land is not robbed of nutrients like hay land is. In light of this, I manage both seperately. I have some pastures that haven't seen a fertilizer application in years and they produce excellent forage. However, when I got overzealous and hayed one of these pastures I found the next year's growth was less than desirable and it took it several months to regain itself. In light of this I try to view the hay ground seperately and place all my inputs here. When I "rob" these nutrients they are merely transferred to the pasture ground via the cattle. Since cattle retain such a small percentage of the actual nutrients from the hay it stands to reason that the pasture land is actually being gradually built up with time from manure deposits and the natural nutrient cycle.

I'm not trying to convince you I am right only sharing my beliefs for I have more questions today than I have answers. But in all, I try to look at things in terms of a nutrient system and I do know that you cannot continue to take more nutrients from a site than it is capable of naturally replenishing without dior consequences later on. I think the key is balance. Finding the correct balance given your particular situation is the key and this is also what makes this so dang interesting to me.

 

[Jim62]

I've seen that done with grazing pastures, but I would have some doubts about it in a hayfield situation.

Wonder what the nutritional value of the hay is like ?

 

[Fred Belknap]

That would be great not to have to use ferterlizer and produce a bumper crop. I have my doubts. It just seems to go against common sense that if you keep taking something out of the soil that somewhere down the line it is going to become depleted. Given that some land is much better than others it might take a long time for some to show a decline. With the price of ferterllizer I might have to give it a try. I'm sure it would produce but the question is how much and how good. But if you find a way I would like to give it a try.
Fred

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

How often dose your neighbor cut. Only once a year or more, and what kind of grasses.

 

[grannysoo]

Jo is right on track with his answer.

 

[Bluestem]

How often dose your neighbor cut. Only once a year or more, and what kind of grasses.

Once a year. Its one of the best prairies I've seen.

 

[Bluestem]

Bluestem, in all sincerity I would like it very much to have a neighbor such as yourself to compare different outside the box experiments with. While I do think it possible to have a zero input cattle operation I do not think this would be economically possible in my situation. That said, I think there are many things one can do to enhance forage growth while reducing costs. Your post mentions pastures. I agree that you can have good pastures with little input or no input costs in most years but I do not think you can do this with hay ground. Grazing land is not robbed of nutrients like hay land is. In light of this, I manage both separately. I have some pastures that haven't seen a fertilizer application in years and they produce excellent forage. However, when I got overzealous and hayed one of these pastures I found the next year's growth was less than desirable and it took it several months to regain itself. In light of this I try to view the hay ground separately and place all my inputs here. When I "rob" these nutrients they are merely transferred to the pasture ground via the cattle. Since cattle retain such a small percentage of the actual nutrients from the hay it stands to reason that the pasture land is actually being gradually built up with time from manure deposits and the natural nutrient cycle.

I'm not trying to convince you I am right only sharing my beliefs for I have more questions today than I have answers. But in all, I try to look at things in terms of a nutrient system and I do know that you cannot continue to take more nutrients from a site than it is capable of naturally replenishing without dior consequences later on. I think the key is balance. Finding the correct balance given your particular situation is the key and this is also what makes this so dang interesting to me.

Jogeephus- You are on the track that most will need to follow. I hope no one goes off next year and tries "no fertilizer". It will be a failure, guaranteed. The hay ground I was talking about is native prairie. Quality? I don't know. Some of his best customers are horse people from Florida. They buy the hay by the trucks.
Remember I said "properly functioning soil".
A prairie is composed of up to 40% legumes, plus forbs, then grass. All the soil life is intact and functioning properly. New knowledge coming to light every day about the soil we walk on. Still very little is known. We know bits and pieces. The key will be tying these pieces together. The most fertile soils in the world were our prairies. Generally could farm them about 20 years before they played out.
Before someone says "a hay field full of weeds". The first plants to be overgrazed are the legumes and forbs. Our cows know something we don't.

 

[bigbull338]

How often dose your neighbor cut. Only once a year or more, and what kind of grasses.

Once a year. Its one of the best prairies I've seen.

prairie grass meadows are only cut once a year.an thats usually after july 1st.an native grass does make alot of hay.they prolly make 4000 to 8000 rolls a year.

 

[mermill2]

Letting the ground lay fallow every 7th year helps too.

 

[Bluestem]

Letting the ground lay fallow every 7th year helps too.

That is a practice mentioned in one of the oldest agricultural books in existence. Few of us feel we can follow the recommendation. I have been giving it a thought though. My future plan is to give a piece of land a rest every seven. Now to get the courage to do it.

 

[1982vett]

Letting the ground lay fallow every 7th year helps too.

That is a practice mentioned in one of the oldest agricultural books in existence. Few of us feel we can follow the recommendation. I have been giving it a thought though. My future plan is to give a piece of land a rest every seven. Now to get the courage to do it.

Biblical

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

Quite abit of good advice in that book. I would agree there is a good bit that we don't no about the soil. We should not wait till we can't afford fertilizer before we start trying to figure out how to do with out it. If we would have done that with oil we might be better of now.

 

[Jogeephus]

A young man came by seeking my advice on hay production. The young man is still in high school but he has an admirable work ethic and locked down several hay fields for his little business. One of the hay fields has been cut for the last six years with no fertilizer application. The soil test on this was so poor that half the rate of fertilizer was going to cost $485/acre. The buffer was totally depleted. I suggested he leave this field alone. It is fallow now and I've learned the last cutting yielded a bale an acre.

This is what scares me about some of the snake oil that's out there. Based on opinions of people that should know and whom I respect, some of these tonics will work UNTIL the reserves are gone. What they do is help mine the existing nutrients. I know a few people who are really going to be upset in a few years.

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

If fertilize prices doubles agin what do you do then? When it costs more to produce the crop than the crop is worth we will all be out of busniess.

 

[Jogeephus]

If fertilize prices doubles agin what do you do then? When it costs more to produce the crop than the crop is worth we will all be out of busniess.

I agree. Or the industry will change in such a way that we will not recognize it. Only way I can see doing it is to lower the stocking rate to the point that it really won't be worth raising them unless they increase our prices substantially. I still think monopolies and gov't regulation are to blame for these huge increases in fertilizer costs.

 

[novatech]

I have a couple of hay fields that the owner wants me to cut and bale every year just to get their ag. exemption. I cut it once a year and it seem to make fair hay. Although I doubt that the protein is very high the cattle seem to do well on it. The meadows are a mixture of prairie grasses (mostly little bluestem) an the most abundant legumes Illinois Bundle Flower. I cut the hay after it has seeded out, replenishing the legume for the following year. Through the winter burr clover covers the ground and is left to put some N back into the soil.
I can grant you that these meadows do not produce the bumper crops that the hybrid grasses produce with added nutrition but I can also see where a natural production of native grasses is possible, although far less productive. I can also understand where native grasses get their N from (legumes) but where does the P and K come from?
We may be getting to the point that these prestine pastures of hybrid grasses are no longer the order of the day. They do have high input costs and really do nothing to replenish the soil. The mixed pastures of selected low input, drought hardy grasses combined with winter and summer legumes may be the saviour of the future cattleman.
Adjustments of stocking rates to take care of the forage is a cattleman's first priority. Proper stocking can make the difference between a profit or a loss.

 

[Jogeephus]

We may be getting to the point that these prestine pastures of hybrid grasses are no longer the order of the day. They do have high input costs and really do nothing to replenish the soil. The mixed pastures of selected low input, drought hardy grasses combined with winter and summer legumes may be the saviour of the future cattleman.
Adjustments of stocking rates to take care of the forage is a cattleman's first priority. Proper stocking can make the difference between a profit or a loss.

Here, bahia is called poor man's grass and its about like the Energizer Bunny cause it just keeps growing and growing on a slow but steady rate. This grass is the backbone of my operation and finding a balance between it and the bermuda seems to be the key in my area. Problem I see is that the improvements that were made in fertility and forages were all done to make an operation more productive. With slim margins and other things competing for land this trend may put more people out of agriculture.

 

[BC]

I think I have seen several good ideas on this thread. In my area of East Texas we have mostly improved bermuda , common bermuda and bahia. With the costs of fertilizer, it looks like we have two choices - reduce the amount of fertilizer and add legumes with a slight decrease in stocking rates or totally stop fetilization and cut our stocking rates by 3/4 to 1/2. I also feel we will need to go to more of an intensive grazing program where cattle are contained in smaller paddocks and moved daily. This will improve manure distibution, recycle nutrients and give a short rest period for regrowth.

 

[Stocker Steve]

If fertilize prices doubles agin what do you do then? When it costs more to produce the crop than the crop is worth we will all be out of busniess.

Grain growers on less than ideal land are used to spending more per acre than the crop is worth. The difference today is the $ per acre has increased and they do not get LDP. Cash rents have doubled in my area over the last two years even though there have not been a good corn yield for the last three. I lost money on droughty corn last year and I seeded all of my remaining plow ground to alfalfa or red clover this spring.

Beef growers on less than ideal land have another option. Today hay is being sold in many areas for less than its fertilizer value. I sold the creep feeders I bought when corn was $1.60 per bushel. I am currently buying a lot of hay, some K to balance out the P, a lot of lime, and clover seed. This keeps the beef operation in the black and improves my soil - - but my stocking density and my profit per acre are not as high as when I applied cheap N twice a year and yearlings sold for $114/cwt.. I am not meeting some of my goals and so I am not satisfied with this coping approach.

I could cash flow grazing land a couple years ago but many things have changed now. I think we have experienced a "Black Swan" event. It seems the magic of mob grazing, and lower input forages, are needed to prosper.