Rotational Grazing Advice Needed

[bhooper]

I need something to graze from Sept 1 till Dec 20th so only do 20 acres. I try to put 55 lb of actual nitrogen ( about 130lb of urea) per acre on it.
I might run out of grass before Dec 20, but if I do I unroll hay until then. It's easier to feed here in late November/early December than all of Feburary. This year I dont think i will need to feed until late February and turn out by April 1-5.
Also I will still rotate them when I have to start feeding. Here we get some growth all winter plus it spreads the manure and any waste over a larger area.
All this said and if we get a big snow everything changes until it's gone. I still unroll the hay on the snow.

Why do you use urea instead of ammonium nitrate? I ask because this article says to use ammonium nitrate and if you use urea it should be coated. Do you have the urea coated?
http://utbeef.com/Content%20Folders/Center%20Information%20Pages/default/Front%20Page%20Articles/Publications/Article%20Archive/2016%20Monthly%20Articles/BatesSeptember2016.pdf

 

[kenny thomas]

I need something to graze from Sept 1 till Dec 20th so only do 20 acres. I try to put 55 lb of actual nitrogen ( about 130lb of urea) per acre on it.
I might run out of grass before Dec 20, but if I do I unroll hay until then. It's easier to feed here in late November/early December than all of Feburary. This year I dont think i will need to feed until late February and turn out by April 1-5.
Also I will still rotate them when I have to start feeding. Here we get some growth all winter plus it spreads the manure and any waste over a larger area.
All this said and if we get a big snow everything changes until it's gone. I still unroll the hay on the snow.

Why do you use urea instead of ammonium nitrate? I ask because this article says to use ammonium nitrate and if you use urea it should be coated. Do you have the urea coated?
http://utbeef.com/Content%20Folders/Center%20Information%20Pages/default/Front%20Page%20Articles/Publications/Article%20Archive/2016%20Monthly%20Articles/BatesSeptember2016.pdf

Ammonium nitrate is impossible to get here. I use Ureaa coated with nitrosphere

 

[bhooper]

Do spread P & K at the same time?

 

[kenny thomas]

No I do not. P and K is spread about November if soil sample says it's needed

 

[Stocker Steve]

The spring flush is a good problem to have. You can tweak turnout, but that will not optimize grazing in a normal year. Need to either:

a) have someone make some balage for you on the unneeded paddocks
b) have some temporary cattle like yearlings to sell in the summer
c) increase stocking density with polywire and have them trample mature forage

 

[AntebellumAcres]

Not sure if this has already been mentioned, but one thing to consider when doing the year to year dance of balancing beef and grass... Don't be afraid to set set the shredder super high, and cut in the boot stage, maybe a few weeks ahead of the rotations. It isn't perfect, but in my experience it generally helps turn back the clock on the grass and promote leaf development before it begins to seed out again. During a wet spring, we generally have to do this if adding stockers to the cow herd isn't economical.

 

[Stickney94]

The spring flush is a good problem to have. You can tweak turnout, but that will not optimize grazing in a normal year. Need to either:

a) have someone make some balage for you on the unneeded paddocks
b) have some temporary cattle like yearlings to sell in the summer
c) increase stocking density with polywire and have them trample mature forage

It's funny, the lesson shared on this thread and my experience this year, the couple of paddocks I graze early and often due to their being part of the access to/from the pasture are the greenest paddocks at the moment.

c) good suggestion, I have lots of polywire paddocks but I may move to splitting the herd to cycle through the paddocks more quickly in early spring.