February is for Frost Seeding

Christine Gelley– OSU Extension Agriculture and Natural Resources Educator, Noble County, Ohio

February is here and it comes with a flood of hearts, flowers, chocolates, and romance. It also brings weather that triggers maple syrup season and the ideal conditions for frost seeding pastures. If your valentine is a pasture manager, I have the perfect gift idea ahead!

Say “I love you” with the gift of clover seed! Instead of a bouquet of roses, consider a bag of red clover. Instead of fancy wine, consider an improved variety of white clover. Maybe just go ahead and get all of the above though, just to be safe.

Not convinced yet? Let me explain why February is a fantastic time to share the love of legumes.

The ideal time for frost seeding tends to be mid-February. When the water in the upper horizon of the soil freezes, the water expands, which leads to pressure that forces soil up and out during a freeze. Then when the Continue reading

Tips to Stretch Short Hay Supplies

– Dr. Jeff Lehmkuhler, PhD, PAS, Beef Extension Professor, University of Kentucky

Below are a few tips to consider stretching limited hay supplies. For additional information contact your local Extension agent. It is recommended to consult with your feed nutritionist or County ANR Agent before making drastic changes in your feeding program.

  1. Inventory hay – know how much hay you have available; weigh a few bales to get an average weight or estimate the weights based on available information from Extension publications.
  2. Minimize storage losses – keep hay off the ground on a surface that will allow water to drain away; keep bales covered or stored inside a barn; if bale grazing limit the number of bales placed in the field to provide 2-4 weeks of feeding to reduce weathering losses.
  3. Reduce feeding loss – consider minimizing feeding losses; using hay rings with skirts / metal on the bottom, tapered ring designs, chains to suspend bales, or cone inserts to keep hay inside the feeder has been proven to reduce hay feeding losses compared to hay rings with openings at the bottom; using an electrified temporary poly-wire placed down the center of unrolled hay will reduce losses from cows laying on the hay, trampling it into the mud, and defecating on the hay; feeding processed hay into a bunk or large industrial tire reduces waste compared to feeding processed hay on the ground.
  4. Cull – consider selling less productive females, open cows, and cows with structural/functional issues to reduce the number you must over winter; consider selling the bull as the market may provide the opportunity to sell a mature bull and replace him with a younger bull next spring.
  5. Limit time access to hay – research has shown dry cows in mid-gestation can be maintained on good quality hay when they have restricted access time to only 6-8 hours a day; the hay savings comes from less waste as feeding behavior is altered; all cows must be able to access hay at any given time; this is not recommended young or thin cows, lactating cows or growing animals.
  6. Substitute hay with grain – calories and protein can be provided from supplements; grain/commodity mixes can be used to replace hay; cows can be maintained on a low hay diet by using grain supplementation that balances the nutrient supply and animal requirements; consult a nutritionist before making extreme feeding changes.
  7. Deworm young animals – animals with an internal parasite burden will have reduced efficiency.
  8. Feed an ionophore – if grain supplementation will be used, consider adding an ionophore to increase the energy efficiency of the feed consumed. Consult your nutritionist to discuss inclusion rates and developing a supplement program. Previous work has shown that feeding 200 mg of monensin allowed cows to maintain body condition on 10-15% less hay.

Small Carpetgrass: Another invasive grass to watch for

Jordan Penrose, Ohio State University Extension Agriculture and Natural Resources Educator, Gallia County

Small carpetgrass is a new annual invasive grass weed.

Earlier this fall as dad and I were going along checking and fixing fence along a field that we have been stockpiling for cattle, we found a grass that we had never noticed in the field or on the farm before. The first thought that came to mind was that it was Japanese stiltgrass, but after looking up some pictures of Japanese stiltgrass on our phones, we determined it was not. Then we went and used a plant ID app on a phone to see what it would come with, and it identified it as small carpetgrass. To verify, we searched for small carpetgrass on the internet looking at an Extension website to confirm.

Small carpetgrass also known as joint-head grass, was introduced into the U.S. from Japan and eastern Asia. The earliest reports of the plant are from the early 1970s. Small carpetgrass is an annual invasive grass weed that thrives in sunny, moist areas and prefers wet habitats like stream banks, pond and lake margins, wetlands, and disturbed areas. We found it an area where the soil gets disturbed from where we feed round bales on pasture in the winter. This fall we did notice the grass died off with the first frost and that our cattle avoided eating it. What stuck out the most about this grass was the Continue reading

Stockpile; Take it now, or take it later?

– Victor Shelton, Retired NRCS Agronomist/Grazing Specialist

Should I still be grazing stockpiled forage?

I’d quickly take one of the hottest weeks in the summer over some of the frigid weather we have seen this winter. My wife just hopes that the long, icy-cold period was long enough to set back the stink bugs still hanging around.

Cold weather can have some advantages, especially after some of the rains we received lately. If you are having to concentrate livestock or are wanting to graze wet or saturated ground, frozen ground or free concrete has some advantages.

If you are still grazing stockpiled forage, frozen ground helps to protect the soil surface and reduce compaction from hooves. In reality, if you have a good stand of stockpile, it has to get almost bitter cold to freeze that ground. The blanket of forage serves as pretty good insulation. Like I’ve said before, if I have to dig a hole in the winter time, I’m for sure going to dig where I have heavy sod, it is most likely not frozen.

On the contrary, ground that has Continue reading

The role of sulfur in pastures

Dan Lima, OSU ANR Extension Educator, Belmont County

Sulfur is needed in legumes for nitrogen fixation.

Sulfur is an element found in two out of the 20 protein-forming amino acids in plants. It is also essential for chlorophyll production, the most important pigment in the plant kingdom.

Additionally, a higher amount of sulfur is needed in legumes for nitrogen fixation. Legumes are thought to be the most sensitive plants to sulfur deficiency due to the fact it will slow down all three essential functions in this category.

For these reasons, plants, and all life for that matter, need sulfur to survive. It is considered a secondary macro-nutrient because of its essential requirement at lower levels than the other macro-nutrients: nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. Plant symptoms of sulfur deficiency are Continue reading

Posted in Forages

Ohio Forage and Grasslands Council to Meet in Cambridge, Ohio

Christine Gelley, Agriculture and Natural Resources Educator, Noble County OSU Extension

Make plans now to attend on February 9th.

The Ohio Forage and Grasslands Council will be hosting their 2024 Annual Meeting on Friday, February 9, 2024 from 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at Deerassic Park Education Center (14250 Cadiz Road Cambridge, Ohio 43725). This meeting serves as an opportunity to interact with forage growers of all backgrounds and interests and share with each other. Along with socialization you can listen to intriguing presentations, interact with vendors of forage growing supplies, and enjoy a delicious lunch.

The Ohio Forage and Grasslands Council is Ohio’s commodity organization for pasture and hay crops. The Ohio State University partners closely with the Ohio Forage and Grasslands Council to support forage education, research, and outreach throughout the state. It is the only organization of its kind, bringing together farmers, conservationists, academics, industry representatives, and service personnel into a shared environment to converse and build relationships that lead to more productive forage and grassland ecosystems and more profitable farm operations. The Ohio Forage and Grasslands Council is the state affiliate organization of the American Forage and Grassland Council. Ohio members are automatically extended membership to the national level for even more networking opportunities and learning experiences.

The 2024 meeting theme is “Feeding Forages ↔ Forages Feeding Us” and Continue reading

Are you managing your pastures “ugly?”

– Victor Shelton, Retired NRCS Agronomist/Grazing Specialist

If hay’s in short supply, be efficient feeding it!

Back when no-till farming was fairly new, one familiar catch phrase was “Farm Ugly.” Managing pastures in a more regenerative fashion sometimes appears a bit ugly too.

Right or wrong, I finally finished clipping the last few paddocks at the end of November. It wasn’t because they really needed to be clipped, but more because they were aesthetically more pleasing afterwards. It also puts most of them in the same starting phase for next less places for coyotes to hide.

I didn’t really procrastinate the task. With the dry conditions and slowed fall growth, I certainly didn’t want to remove or deter any grazable forage, so I waited until after the last grazing of those paddocks to clean it up by clipping them. Other pastures that were stockpiled didn’t need to be trimmed but a couple were done anyways because the wife insisted.

It has been a dry fall. I’ve had Continue reading

After 35 years, reviewing “the changes’

Penrose spent much of his career advocating stockpiling, bale grazing, and carefully managing forage resources,

EDITOR’s NOTE: After 35 years of service to Ohio’s agriculture industry as an Extension Educator, as he retires our colleague Chris Penrose takes a look back at 35 years of change and progress. Congratulations Chris on a job well done!

Chris Penrose, Extension Educator, Agriculture & Natural Resources, Morgan County

I remember my first day in Extension back in the 1980’s when I started an internship with Hank Bartholomew, the Perry Co. Ag Agent and he was very involved with ways to extend the grazing season and Management Intensive Grazing. He, Daryl Clark, Tom Noyes, Ed Vollborn, Bob Hendershot and Gary Wilson were the ones that got me interested and were pushing these concepts around Ohio and beyond. I consider them to be on the Mt. Rushmore of grazing here in Ohio and I did my best to learn from them.

Over the past 35 years, we have seen Continue reading

Managing Pastures for Winter

Jordan Penrose, Gallia County Agriculture & Natural Resources Extension Educator

Are you still grazing?

Wintertime is here, for good or for bad, and managing pasture with livestock can be tricky in the winter. You have some factors to consider during the winter, such as grazing management, forage quality, supplemental feeding, and planning for the future. Let’s take a look at these key aspects to see if any can improve your pastures during the winter.

Grazing Management:

Depending on your grazing strategy, stocking density, and how your forages produced this year will factor into where you are at right now. If you implement rotational grazing on your farm, you may still be grazing your livestock or just starting to feed hay. But when the ground gets wet and muddy due to snow, rain, and freezing and thawing, do you have a plan for your livestock to keep your pastures from being destroyed and keep your livestock’s daily intake of feed where it needs to be, so they do not lose condition. Do you have a heavy-use pad that you can put livestock on when the conditions are bad. Can you Continue reading

Toxic Tall Fescue: Recommendations and Reality

– Dr. Chris Teutsch, Extension Associate Professor and Forage Specialist, University of Kentucky

.

I wrote this article several years ago for the forages session at the Kentucky Cattlemen’s Annual Meeting. It is a summary of management strategies for utilizing tall fescue in grazing systems. How we approach tall fescue management in grazing systems is NOT black and white, but rather nuanced by a number of practical considerations. In some cases, replacement of toxic stands with improved novel endophyte (non-toxic endophyte) varieties does not always make sense. The objective of this article is to help you work through those considerations to determine the best path forward for managing tall fescue in your operation.

Tall fescue (Schedonorus arundinaceus (Schreb.) Dumort., nom. cons.) is the most important cool-season grass in the transition area between the temperate northern and subtropical southern United States. In most unimproved pastures, tall fescue is infected with a fungal endophyte that imparts tolerance to abiotic and biotic stresses. While this mutualistic relationship improves persistence in low input grazing systems, it also results in the production of alkaloids that cause tall fescue toxicosis. While there are a number of grotesque symptoms associated with this syndrome such as Continue reading