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| Tips from pasture pros (Spring 2005) |
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With the toughest days of winter behind us, it’s time to jump into your utility vehicle, straddle your horse, or just take off for a hike through your pastures. An early spring patrol is a great way to get your fields off to a good start, making sure they provide tasty nutrition for horses and livestock while looking sharp all year long.
Good management of small-acreage pastures isn’t an easy task. You must combine agronomic skills with the ability to manage your animal’s grazing habits so that plants are kept green and tender.
Testing first
Job One while you are on your early spring patrol is to soil test your pastures. The soil test will be your guide for how to fertilize your fields as well as giving you a guide for whether you need to broadcast lime to bring your soil pH up to recommended levels for your area. “The first thing I suggest to anyone is to begin with a soil test,” says Tom Hansen, a University of Missouri agronomy specialist based in Springfield. “In our part of the state, we often see phosphorous (P) levels that are low. Many times when people are facing poor pasture conditions, the cause can be traced back to low soil pH or low P levels.” Once you’ve tested your soil and have a fertility plan in place, you won’t have to soil test each pasture every year. Set up a rotation so that each of your fields is soil tested at least once every three years, making sure fertility and pH levels are being maintained.
You may be surprised by the amount of fertilizer that experts recommend for cool-season pastures such as bluegrass, fescue, or orchardgrass. Dan Morrical, an Iowa State University animal scientist, points out that nitrogen (N) applications often range from 40 to 150 pounds annually. He points out that recommendations for more than 50 pounds per acre should be applied in split applications. “If 140 pounds of N is required, you could apply 60 pounds in early April, 40 pounds in mid-June, and 40 pounds in mid-August,” he says. “This kind of fertility program evens out the growth rate and keeps pasture stands healthy and vigorous.”
Add a legume
In many areas of the country you can establish legumes in your pastures by overseeding in late winter or early spring. Ideal pastures generally are a mix of grasses and legumes. Grasses generally can be grazed earlier in the spring and later in the fall, and grasses develop a thick turf that discourages weeds and wards off damage from trampling.
Legumes form a symbiotic association with soil bacteria to “fix” nitrogen, providing enough N for their own growth while boosting grasses in the pasture stand as well. Legumes such as red clover also provide a high-protein, palatable food source for livestock. Rutgers University experts recommend ladino clover for use with tall pasture grasses. Horse owners often prefer a highly palatable legume such as lespedeza for the pasture stand.
Grazing or clipping pastures in early spring will help reduce competition from grasses and allow light into the canopy to help legumes flourish. A rest period in early summer will let legumes grow and be a ready source of nutrition for mid-summer grazing.
Herbicides or good old hand labor can help you get ahead of pasture invaders such as weeds and woody sprouts. Spot treatments with non-selective herbicides such as Roundup can be very effective in early spring when used on emerging Canada thistle or musk thistle plants. If a broadcast herbicide treatment for winter annual weeds is needed, it should be done in spring, before these
unwanted plants can produce seed.
Herbicides also are available to control sprouts and multiflora rose that creep into pastures and take up valuable moisture. If you have only a few sprouts, you may be able to patrol your pastures with a pair of pruning shears, cutting the invaders as low as possible to the ground. Hand-cutting larger woody plants and simultaneously applying a herbicide such as Tordon RTU can help eliminate these pasture-robbing problems. Mowing areas such as fence lines before winter annuals have a chance to develop seed heads also will help keep pasture stands pure.
Fix your field
Some parts of your pasture may have been punished by damage from use as a feeding area during winter. Frequent moving of feed troughs or bale rings can help reduce the damage, but likely you have some spots where wasted hay needs to be forked up and spread. Compacted and trampled areas may need to be worked up and reseeded before they become weedy spots. Harrowing or “dragging” pastures breaks up manure for easier absorption into soil as well as exposing parasites to a fatal dose of sunlight.
While you are evaluating your pasture, consider ways to control grazing over the coming year. “Consider time-limited or rotational grazing, particularly for horses on small acreages,” says David Freeman, an equine specialist with Oklahoma State University. Rotate through two or more cells so that Bermuda grass isn’t grazed below two inches, and not below three inches for cool-season grasses. If you can’t subdivide pastures, “consider limiting grazing to short periods, such as four hours a day,” he suggests.
The payoff - watching your animals graze this year on a well-managed and well-manicured field. It can be a beautiful sight.
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