Spring pasture turnout?

[Kell-inKY]

Is there a standard way/timeframe/grass height to turn cattle out on spring pasture? This is my 3rd spring with my little herd (5 hopefully pregnant heifers and 1 bull). This year it has been REALLY wet and they are trampling the pasture, that has led me to speed up my timeframe for crossfencing smaller sections on my little 20 acres. (That's all the pasture I have while I try to convert some rowcrop).

Anyway, I have made a small pasture and just started confining them to it, put in water and hopefully my last bale of hay. They aren't too happy because before they were free to roam and eat the growing grass, they can still eat fresh grass but not like before. Confining them to the small corral/feedlot is not an option as it is a total mess with all the rain.

Do most people confine them until the grass gets a certain height or do they just let the cattle ease into it? I want a good healthy pasture this year, and don't want a bunch of cattle going nuts on 8" of grass and getting sick. I'm giving minerals that the feed store recommends. I rotated last year but the fields were much too large to be effective (considering it's only 20 acres of course), I had 2 large fields and some smaller that I sectioned off to save for late fall.

At this point I think they were doing more damage with their hooves than by eating it too low, or I could be over thinking it?

Any thoughts,
Thanks! Kell

 

[dun]

We turn out when the grass is 6-8 inches and starting to grow well.. Today is the day for us. Break your larger areas into smaller pastures and rig up water to each area. Poly wire, step in posts and a good 12 volt battery charger works great. Just rotate them through them every couple of days.

 

[JW IN VA]

Like dun says.Don't turn out too early.Cattle get restless wanting to go to grass before its ready.There is some relationship between the height of grass and root formation.

 

[torogmc81]

We turn out when the grass is 6-8 inches and starting to grow well.. Today is the day for us. Break your larger areas into smaller pastures and rig up water to each area. Poly wire, step in posts and a good 12 volt battery charger works great. Just rotate them through them every couple of days.

Do you throw out the bloat block a week before turnout?

 

[dun]

We turn out when the grass is 6-8 inches and starting to grow well.. Today is the day for us. Break your larger areas into smaller pastures and rig up water to each area. Poly wire, step in posts and a good 12 volt battery charger works great. Just rotate them through them every couple of days.

Do you throw out the bloat block a week before turnout?

Nope, they get pretty gassy but never (knock on wood) have had a bloat issue. They're eating probably about 50% green grass and 50% old tall dried up stockpiled stuff now. They have to eat through the dry stuff to eat the green.

 

[greybeard]

just don't stand or walk too close behind them!

 

[kjonesel]

I have plenty of hay and I have my cows up on just 20 acres (50 animals). I'm planning on keeping them up for another six weeks. I have went over all my other pasture the past couple of weeks and applied more seed to try and thicken the stand. I'm not sure what happened but my established stands are extremely thin this year.

 

[Supa Dexta]

I also don't turn out when it's too wet. Not only does the grass have to be there, but its no good if they are going to cut the ground all up and kill half of it.

 

[Stocker Steve]

No std
Some wait to maximize tonnage
Some turnout early so it will not get away from them
Some supplement to keep DM up
Some just run out of feed and don't give a damm