ROTATIONAL GRAZING

Taranaki Daily News, 1 December 1932, Page 16

ROTATIONAL GRAZING

PRACTICAL FARM HINTS PROPER UTILISATION OF PASTURES ITS OUTSTANDING IMPORTANCE. Almost invariably at this time of the year the feed available on pastures is in excess of the requirements of stock, and the task of major importance fdcing farmers is the effective utilisation of the surplus growth. This being' a bountiful season, the need for proper control of pasture growth is intensified- Consequently the scope is greater than usual for tire employment of such measures as ensilage and “topping.” While it would be unfortunate to minimise the importance of ensilage and topping as means, of maintaining pastures in a vigorous leafy condition, it is very desirable not to overlook the fact that the grazier’s principal tool" is the grazing animal, and consequently that skilful manipulation of stock in grazing is of prime importance. On many farms this consists mainly in the adoption of la judicious system of rotational grazing. Essential features of such a system are (1) intensive in contradistinction to extensive grazing; (2) periodical, even, and fairly close grazing of fields; (3) spelling of fields for periods of substantially longer duration than the periods during wheih the fields are grazed. Intensive grazing is effected by concentrating stock on the fields being grazed. For example, -in dairying under a system of rotational grazing the whole herd is confined to one or two fields, and the remainder of the farm under pasture is thus spelled. As a rule, stocking at the rate-of six or more cows to the acre constitutes intensive grazing. Ordinarily in dairying a field should be stocked heavily enough to bring about periodical grazings of not more than two to three days’ duration. To fields which are grazed for periods of longer duration there, often attaches, towards the end of the periods, a staleness which detrimentally affects the animals.

AVOIDING “PUNISHMENT.” While a field needs to be eaten down evenly and fairly closely before stock are transferred from it, it is important to remember in practice that both punishment of stock and punishment of swards need to be avoided. In his zeal to effect even, close grazing a farmer may readily overreach himself, and. in this connection the degree of closeness which is usually advisable has at times been exaggerated. It the stock consist principally of cows in milk it will be necessary to transfer them from a paddock early enough to avoid any undesirable falling-off in production that would be brought about by keeping them longer on the paddock, At times, especially if droppings have not regularly been distributed, this involves transferring stock from a field before patches of ranker growth are eaten down. It is highly desirable to remove without delay the tall growth, from such patches. This may be done either by the employment of dry stock to continue the grazing of the field immediately the milking stock have been removed, or by topping of the rank uneaten patches with the mower. Dry stock, to be effective for this purpose, must be available in numbers sufficient to lead to the eating down of the rank patches within, a few days, and as often the stock are not available in such numbers then topping needs to be. adopted. Regular and thorough distribution of droppings by means of harrowing makes It much easier to maintain an even leafy growth over grassland during spring and early summer. It is advisable to endeavour to avoid harrowing the grass just before a dry spell, for rain is needed to remove the soiling of the feed which harrowing at times brings about. It is timely to consider that under certain circumstances dose grazing pasture?, apart from the undesirable punishment of milking stock which it is apt to involve, may lead to lowering of the yield of herbage. Such lowering of the rate of, growth may occur not only during the critical dry period which frequently is experienced in the latter half of summer, but also later on and for considerable periods, especially if . close grazing is practised repeatedly. A special endeavour should be made to avoid clpse grazing a short- time before the customary dry summer spell, during which it is desirable to have the surface of the land covered as completely as possible

which has been spelled not necessarily ' with vegetation. ROTATION OF GRAZING. v Stock should be returned to a field when all other paddocks available for

grazing have been eaten down in turn, but when the growth on the spelled paddock is at the stage best suited for grazing. For instance, , on a farm on which ten paddocks are being grazed, one paddock may be . ready tor. gracing again when only-seven of the other nine paddocks have been grazed. In such a case the two ungrazed paddocks should" be dropped from the grazing programme for a.while, and a return made;by the stock to the paddock which h as so recovered from previous grazing as to be .at. the best stage for grazing again. It is of vital importance: to drop promptly from the grazing programme any fields which in early summer are .providing feed in excess of tire current requirements of the stock. Good control of pasture growth at this ■ period is of such value as to justify closing a'field from grazing evep though the manner in which the surplus growth on it will be used eventually is not determined. The dropping of sufficient fields from the grazing programme will ensure that the growth on the remainder is properly controlled, and it is better to achieve this, even if some feed on the closed-up fields is not used to the best advantage, than to face the alternative result—uncontrolled growth on all the fields under grazing. Effective rotational grazing, can be carried out without abnormally close subdivision of farms. This is indicated by the fact. that, highly satisfactory rotational grazing is being practised on farms consisting of from nine to twelve fields. During the season of rapid growth of pastures it is frequently advisable to return the grazing animals to a field after it has been spelled for: a period of six to ten days, and if grazing is confined to four to six fields, each of which is stocked periodically for one, to three days, then suitable periods of spelling are obtained for each field. SUMMER TOP-DRESSING. At times, for the purpose of stimulating fresh leafy growth in the latter part of the summer, it may be an advantage to top-dress some of the pastures of a farm with superphosphate in early summer. It is to be expected that such topdressing would . prove most effective in districts in which a good deal of rain falls in December and January, and that as the December-January rainfall decreases it would decline in effectiveness as a means of obtaining additional late summer, leafy, fresh growth, until a point would be reached when it probably would not be worth doing. Areas from which hay or silage’ have been saved generally respond profitably to a December application of super, which; is likely to lead to an increased produc-

tion of leafy feed at a season when such feed is frequently in scant supply. ENSILAGE. Those desirous of obtaining full information about the best methods to employ in ensilage should consult Bulletin 146, obtainable free on application to the Department of Agriculture. . A common fault in ensilage is the development of too high a temperature m the freshly gathered green material. This is often associated with another fault, the harvesting of the material in too mature a condition, a fault which was discussed in last month’s notes. Usually sufficient heat has been developed in stored green material when it commences to sink down relatively rapidly—more rapidly than" settling down due merely to the weight of the material. As a rule, the changes in the green material which result in the production of high-quality silage have taken place when temperatures in the vicinity of 100 degrees F. have developed. At times, and especially in stack ensilage, such temperatures develop within a day after the gathering of the green material, and in such cases the storing of the silage, may proceed daily. But at other times, and particularly when leafy watery crops are being handled and during cold or wet weather, the rise in temperature may occur more slowly, with" the result that it becomes advisable to allow two days, or even more occasionally, to elapse before more green material is added to that already in the stack or pit. On the other hand, if the material for silage is relatively dry and stemmy, and particularly if the weather is fine and warm, overheating is likely to occur unless additions arg made daily to the green material already gathered. Usually ’daily additions of 4ft to 6ft in height, according to the condition of the green material, give good results. Development of heat is glower in pits and trenches than in Stacks and slower in sappy leafy material than in stemmy material. HAYMAKING.

The loss of valuable nutriment which is bound to occur in haymaking may at times be considerably . reduced by good management.. The loss, being largely invisible, often receives less consideration than it warrants, and it is likely that ,if farmers realised more fully how great the loss may be they would take more pains to reduce it. It was stated in a recent number -of the journal of the Ministry of Agriculture (England): “Even under good "conditions at least 20 per pent, of the original dry matter of the grass is lo?t in the process of haymaking. When bad. weather occurs the leaching of the food nutriments by rain may account fof. the loss of 50 per cent, of the dry matter, and when hay is stacked in poor condition further serious loss of nutriments and deterioration of feeding value occurs in the stack.” • There is no evidence or ground for believing that the position is substantially different in New, Zealand from that in England.

Frequently, in an endeavour to have the haymaking coincide with a period of fine weather, the mowing is carried out too late, and an inferior hay, due to. the gtemmy character of. the material, is necessarily secured. The advantages of mowing, at the leafy, early flowering stage of the bulk of -the material are so great that they warrant special measures in an endeavour to save the hay in good condition. , Cocking is one of these measures. Over a considerable portion of the Dominion is it seldom possible to save a heavy crop of hay in really good condition- without cocking. This is vital practical difference between a weli-nearted and raked hay-cock and a mere heap. The heap becomes sodden when exposed to rain, but the efficiently built cock will shed much of the rain and be wet only oh the outside. Cocking is particularly serviceable in the saving of lucerne and of clover hay of good quality.

If a period of rainy and unsettled weather occurs immediately, after an area has- been mown, within reasonable .limits, the mown material should not be handled until fine weather seems to have returned; 'any handling that mown material receives' increases the amount of nutriment washed out by the rain, Convenience is only one of the matters which should be considered in selecting the site of a haystack. A good site is well drained and not unduly shaded in a way which is likely to reduce the drying influence of winds. A dry base for the stack should be secured by the use' of such material as posts, rails, or branches of trees. High stacks have the advantage of giving a large amount of hay in proportion to the roof, but the task of raising hay to the top may become unduly great, especially when only manual labour is being employed. Relatively long narrow stacks are often to be preferred, because they favour the more ready drying and cooling of the material. , . The best time to mow lucerne cannot always be determined by the flowering development. Suffer guidances is -provided in the development of basal shoots. When fresh shoots at the bases or crowns of the plants are about an inch long the lucerne should be mown. GENERAL CROPPING WORK,

Over wide areas good, results have been obtained consistently by sowing swedes hi December. Almost, invariably swedes are sown on land ploughed out of grass. This is quite sound practice in view of such diseases as club-root and dry rot, and’ it is instructive to note that in the relatively few instances in the farmers’ field competitions in which swedes followed swedes the resulting . crops were generally comparatively poor. Where it is proposed to sow swedes after, a previous swede or-turnip crop it-is advisable over wide areas in which club-root is' common to use a variety such as Herriings, which' has been shown to be resistant to club-root. It is also specially desirable not to employ an acid manure, such as superphosphate, . alone, which favours club-root.

Apart from conditions in which there is reason to anticipate trouble from club-root, superphosphate .is a good dressing for swedes; indeed, a dressing consisting of about two parts super and one .part bone manure is widely used with good results at the rate of 2cwt to 3cwt an acre. It is well to bear in mind that super readily causes serious injury to swede and turnip seed if brought into close contact with it even for a short period. Apart from such injury, super is over wide areas the most efficient form of phosphate that can be used with these crops. The injury may be avoided by mixing super with an equal weight of carbonate of lime at least a week before sowing. • A standard practice which gives good results generally is to sow 8 to 14oz of swede seed per acre in rows 14in apart. The varieties of swedes which are popularly favoured are Superlative, Grandtnaster, Masterpiece and Magnum Bonum, with Hemings coming into prominence where club-root is a consideration of moment.

Chou moellier has justly gained considerable popularity during recent years. A characteristic of considerable ’ moment is its marked resistance to club-root. Because of this resistance it may . safely be made to follow swedes, rape, or turnips which were attacked by club root. Chou moellier calls for high fertility; it demands a soil of the type which would suit cabbage. If it is desired to grow chou moellier on inferior, soils their fertility should be improved, farm-yard manure being an excellent dressing for this purpose. If sown in October or November on fertile soils chou moellxer is well adapted to provide feed in late summer. For winter feeding the crop.

may quite well be sown in December. A suitable sowing is lAlb to 21b of seed to the acre broadcast, or. lib to fib in drills 2ft to 3ft apart. The plant responds well to liberal use of fertilisers such as a mixture of super and blood and bone in equal parts; 3cwt to 4cwt per acre of this mixture may usually be applied with profit, and such a dressing may often advantageously be supplemented with lewt of sulphate of ammonia. Chou moellier is less subject to attacks of disease than other members of the cabbage family. It is distinctly suitable for cows, pigs, and poultry. Quite a number of successful sheep-farmers favour it for carrying sheep through the winter.

Maize and millet, to provide green feed, and lucerne often may be sown advantageously- in December. On many farms intertillage and tliinning of root crops sown in-October and November is work-which is also well, worth doing in December./ Spraying of potatoes with bordeaux is widely advisable "in. the coming month.