Pasture renovation

Jen,

You shouldn’t have to till, but to renovate a worn out pasture takes time, like three years or so with sufficient stocking rates,i.e, enough hooves, poop and pee and saliva to impact the biology of your soil. Composted manure and lime are good but there again it takes a while.

We have been restoring a worn out hay field here in Me. that had mostly golden rod, and bed straw in. In two years of attentive grazing, some manure, and lime, combined with timely clippings we’re seeing increased denstiy of grass and clover. The field is changing, but slowly, we really need more animals to do it in a more timely way.

Voisin(sp?)(grass guru) said it tkaes many many years to create good sod if you plow.

Good luck there’s lots of grazing info out there.

NBeal Mcnaughten
Unity, me.

Lots of experience posted here about renewing pasture land.

I would add that I was introduced to Birdsfoot Trefoil when in the northeast as a legume used in old skid trail stabilization and thought it could be a great pasture addition and hay. So I did a little research and found a few different varieties and over seeded it into our pasture and hay fields. We call it poor mans alfalfa, but it is actually better.

It has done great. It last longer that any alfalfa and the taller varieties with actually make in the barn with just the right haying techniques. Trefoil doesn’t have the weevil damage that alfalfa does and doesn’t require the fertility or ph of alfalfa. So look into that legume to improve your grazing and soil conditions in the NE.

Inoculation is an issue, do what is recommended by the seed seller.

We have also over seeded yellow blossom sweet clover for a temporary legume presences that all the stock seem to eat. It is cheap and the number one nitrogen fixer and honey crop.

If their is not enough soil exposed then a light disking could help cover the seed that are broadcast over the ground. Frost seeding will work too. Dragging will tend to clump or make little doodles out of any organic matter left from mowing. Letting the clippings lay where they fall is best and just light disking after broadcasting seed with cover them.

All these recommendations are good proven sound farming practices. Good luck with it.

Lots of great ideas written above. We use horses and mules following sheep and move our graziers every day. that does have a great effect on the pastures. I also clip ( mowing pastures after grazing ) a lot; It is very satisfying horse work. This summer all the rain has held up my hay making, so I clipped more than ever; probably close to 80 acres at this point. All 1, 2, or 3 acres at a time, and many pastures have been clipped more than once. Great results – pastures all green and full of clover. All the extra clipping is starting to have an impact on my bedstraw problem. See clipping pictures here. This June I started to renovate 15 acres across the street for a hay field; solid golden rod. Out of use for at least six years and no fences or water for grazing. I brush hogged it once to save my mowers from the damage of, well brush. Now I am finishing clipping for the first time. Already starting to see grasses coming in. May have to mow it three times next year, but that beats plowing it. I will try to clip it once a year and hay it once a year. I will report the progress as it goes along. Donn

My cattle mostly avoid the goldenrod, but eat bedstraw. The sheep eat the goldenrod down well when it is still relatively young and tender, and strip the leaves off the older stuff but don’t eat the stems.
Thanks, Jason, for bringing up Sweetclover and Trefoil. Depending on soil type they might be the best adapted legumes. Trefoil has a reputation, however, for growing happily on the side of the road but not when you plant it. Sweetclover likes roadsides as well as nice fields.

Re: goats are easier to move than sheep.
Depends on your fencing and moving system. We raised up some alpine bucklings one summer, and won’t get goats again. The trick with goats is that they follow you. Sometimes that’s great. But if you’re trying to set up flexinet with half a dozen bucklings nipping at your heals getting tangled in it, that’s another story. I prefer the sheep, who wait patiently in their fence for me to finish and open a gate for them to go through. The goats got impatient, jumped the fence, and tried to help. Sounds like you’re getting some experience with the jumping factor. Our goats would stay in the fence as long as there weren’t any people around. But if they saw us, they’d come meet us halfway. But they were bottle babies, which certainly didn’t help.

I just want to restate that careful grazing and mowing can work wonders. There may be bigger guns that you could pull out if you wanted (tillage, herbicide), but big guns have a tendency to cause collateral damage.
If there’s not enough good stuff there to encourage, get some late-cut first cutting hay with seeds in it and feed that either in the field or spread the manure there. Just try to get the hay off of a field that has what you want in it and not even worse weeds.

-Tevis

Another point about renovation of soil is the fact that weeds are specific trace element accumulators. The presence of certain weeds can indicate certain micro nutrient needs in the soil and natures way of correcting that is reflected in the presence of these “weeds”. So mowing the weeds and leaving their above ground bodies and below ground roots to decompose may help with overall soil fertility as well as tilth.

There are also some studies that suggest some crops will grow better with some specific weeds. Makes sense.

This is an understanding based upon sound agriculture science and is not a part of rescue chemical dependent farming. It is also in agreement with other philosophies that advise a rotation that includes letting the ground go fallow once every seven years. I don’t think this means do nothing, but to take what the land has to offer and give it back to itself. The fact that weeds do reflect subtle differences in soil fertility or lack of and can be a contributor to the replenishing of the soil seems like a nice natural plan. Mowing them with a sickle bar keeps them right where they came from, to rot and add to soil fertility. If you have to mow several times, so be it, use your animal power and keep it carbon positive….

I also think subsoiling old cropland can be useful for rejuvenation, as a part of tillage for soil fertility not just crop production.

Let us know how it turns out. Thanks for posting…