Stocking Density and Pasture Management

[OneFineAcre]

Here's my situation:

I have 3 Katahdins (one ram, 2 ewes) that I plan to keep as breeding stock and use the lambs as meat.
I have a full-size donkey.
I am 75/25 toward getting a Jersey milk cow.
On my property, I have 5.4 acres total - about 2.5 can be used for pasture (after the buildings, gardens, etc.), with another half as a dedicated hay field. The rest is gardens, buildings, etc.
Of that 2.5, maybe .75 of it semi-wooded. The grass is still lush, but there are some trees - cedar, ash, hickory, etc.
I live along I-24 between Nashville and Chattanooga, to give you an idea of the climate and region. The USDA zone 7 and 6B line runs pretty close to me.
I have a small flock of chickens, with enough coop space to potentially get up to ~40 dual-purpose birds.
I am also looking at starting on meat rabbits soon-ish.
Goats are NOT an option, for various reasons which I will not get into right now.

My goal is to feed everybody without ever having to buy grain, feed, or hay from outside the land.

I fully realize that the donkey is likely the odd man out here once the cow comes along, as 2.5 acres cannot support all of that, and he will likely go. BUT, I have also been receiving conflicting reports about whether 2.5 acres can support a single milking cow plus 3 breeding sheep. I hear some say no way, and others say absolutely it'll work. I can't find anything definitive.

So my question is, is this stocking rate too high? Can I do three sheep and a cow on 2.5 acres? Is .5 acres enough to generate over-winter hay for those guys? If so, how? If not, what would y'all recommend? Smaller cow? Eat the sheep? Milk a llama instead? (not really, but I'm open to creative, non-goat suggestions). Thanks in advance.

I've been reading your entire thread for the last couple of days, but I decided to quote your OP.

I think the answer is "no" you cannot feed these animals off of this space. You cannot produce enough hay off of 1/2 acre to feed during the winter. I doubt very seriously you can feed them adequately when your pasture is lush.

You said goats are not an option, so I will not even question that fact. Doubt you could feed all of them without buying hay and feed even if you went the route of a couple of standard dairy goats anyway. Besides, you never even mentioned grain or alfalfa hay. Dairy cow will need that. Or, are you growing alfalfa on the 1/2 acre?

Like someone else said, go ahead and try any way. Worse thing that will happen is you will have to buy hay and feed or sell animals.

 

[woodsie]

well I am pretty much in the exact same position as you are thinking. I have about 3 acres in fenced pasture, plus another one in weeds and another acre in grass/lawn but not really fenced. I have a Jersey in one acre fenced pasture by herself (well I just added 4 ram lambs). I irrigate non-stop, rotating a sprinkler around. The grass was very lush and in great condition and she is eating it down but I am also supplementing with grain and high quality hay during milking time...she is probably on 10 cups of dairy tex (7 scoops) plus a flake or two of good quality second cut grass hay (twice a day)....not cheap, and my cow is looking a little thin...will need to feed significantly more in winter. Her feet need to get done plus I need to get her AI'd soon. Costs are WAY more than goats but it is a LOT more milk too. I have a real sweetie of a cow but if she wasn't it would be intimidating...make sure you get a really nice natured cow or raise one up yourself.

That being said, she has some weeds in her pasture and her milk is great but the cream has a strange aftertaste...I am getting used to it and use it for garlic butter, and such, sometimes it is fine but never really sweet. The butter is like crazy yellow so I think she is really healthy and has good vitamins but it has a strange flavour. So if you are dreaming of super sweet cream, make sure you have NO weeds. I am hoping it gets sweeter over the winter...it is already much more mild than it was in summer. I will have to makes sure there are no weeds in the pasture next spring.

Goats are certainly a LOT less expensive and easy to care for yourself and we actually prefer the goat's milk taste for drinking milk and cereal but you don't get that cream that seperates to do all that other fun stuff with. I would start with goats and give it a real good go first...the other thing is that you can dry them off and overlap them easier than with a single cow....easier to plan a vacation or make sure you have a continuous milk supply than with a single cow. I love my cow but it is a HUGE investment in time, money and resources...not so sure if I made the right choice yet by getting a cow instead of the goats...ask me when it is -20 and I am hauling water for her with a new baby in tow...lol!

Sorry my post is all over the place I wrote it over the past 2 days.

 

[Baymule]

Bubba, I think you will be overloading your pasture. Pastures need to rest between grazing, so that the grass can grow back. Overgrazing can kill your grass or it can just never recover enough to be that lush pasture you now have. You might help it out by cross fencing and rotate your livestock, but face the inevitable and know that you might have to purchase hay and/or feed. You may consider dry lotting your stock and feeding them so that pastures can grow, then run them on the pasture, then dry lot again.

You might pull it off with intensive pasture management, but you will still have to spend money to maintain and optimize what you have. You might be better off to buy hay and use your planned hay pasture for pasture.

Here is a site that might be helpful to you. Do a search for pasture management and see what else you can find. Study everything you can find, then go for it. Life is an adventure.

http://hayandforage.com/

 

[bubba1358]

I definitely appreciate the advice - thank you all for your input.

I already do some rotational grazing with the sheep and donkey. I would certainly continue that with a cow, allowing several weeks of rest before returning to the same area again. I was thinking of setting up several 1/4 acre plots, and rotating everyone through these. I believe I can get ten of these plots fenced in. Given, say, a week of graze per 1/4 acre, cow on one side, sheep on the other, that would mean a one-week-on, four-weeks-off pasture rotation.

I am already planning on winter dry-lotting. I have a lot of hay harvested for the sheep right now.

I am facing the reality that donkey will probably have to go. And also that I will need to buy some hay. That's fine - I can do that. If ever SHTF, my neighbor has extra land out front that would be fine for additional graze and/or hay - less for her to mow, I suppose.

This has given me lots to think about, with some great insights, and I appreciate it all. Thanks again.

 

[Baymule]

Stop! EERRKKKKKK!!!!! (screetching tires.....) go back to the neighbor that has land out front. Could you lease this land (paid for in eggs, produce, milk etc) for your hay pasture??

 

[bubba1358]

Stop! EERRKKKKKK!!!!! (screetching tires.....) go back to the neighbor that has land out front. Could you lease this land (paid for in eggs, produce, milk etc) for your hay pasture??

::admiring the tire tracks in the road::

More than likely, yes. We are on very good terms with them. Their dog chased my donkey around their house once, but we all had a good laugh about it.

It's a stretch of land between the street, their driveway, my designated hay area, and a grove of cedars. You can't even see it from their house, so I imagine they wouldn't care, especially if they got some farm items in return.

All told, my section of hay (separate from the 2.5 acres we're talking about, FWIW) PLUS this piece of land clocks in a just about an acre, according to the Google maps area calculator. So I'd end up with 2.5 acres of pasture in the back, plus an acre of hay in the front. Doable?

 

[goodhors]

You may want to reconsider the hay field, use it as pasture instead, so you can rotate the animals. Do
you have machinery to do hay with? Cost of machinery, might be too big an investment to pay for doing
your own hay. More cost effective to just buy hay as needed. Counting on friends to do your hay, may
mean you get done last, hay is of lesser value because it was cut late or put up after theirs was done. And
then if they QUIT doing hay, how will you get it in? My friend has a 5 acre field, can't even PAY to have it
cut and baled, no one is interested in spending their time doing it.

We have about 14 acres, have most of it in pasture, VERY GOOD pasture. We graze it all, buy our hay for winter.
Not cost effective for us, to hay part of it, have money in machines, maybe lose the hay to weather, our time
spent baling, and needing to feed that hay longer in the year because we have overgrazed the pastures.

We usually have between 5-7 large horses, who ARE easy keepers to graze. They start on pasture in June, after
the dirt is firm, have been acclimated to grass after a winter of hay feeding. Not taking a chance on laminitus,
so it takes about 5-6 weeks to change them over from hay to full time grass. Fields are soft, get torn up if we
let the horses on them too early. So we feed hay from about Oct. when the grass quits growing, to about June,
each year. However they get NO HAY all summer, with pasture turn out at night. They would totally overgraze
the fields, get obese, if horses were not barned for the daylight hours. I mow often, no shorter than 5 inches,
so grass coming up is edible. Horses, cattle, sheep, just don't eat that tall stemmy stuff. Waste of space to
let the grass get so big and go to seed. Much better to keep grasses shorter, producing ALL the time, for
feeding livestock in a rotational system. You can cut up the bigger fields with electric fences, just move animals more often,
so nothing gets overgrazed. I mow a field when I take the animals off, if we are not in a drought, so it grows
back while resting. Never let the grass go to seed, it quits growing, so no new stuff to graze.

We did the same half day grazing, barned at night with the Dexter heifer, feeder calves, lambs, when DD had
them as 4-H projects. Though they got a flake of hay while in the barn, and horses don't. The non horses,
were out in daylight hours, barned at night in case of roaming pet dogs, with their flake of hay to nibble.

Buying hay, you have to pay money. BUT you won't lose the crop to weather, have to wait on others to get
it up for you, ending up with poor feed-value hay. If some hay you plan to buy gets rained on, you just shop
elsewhere. Might have to pay a bit more, drive a bit further to pick up, but there is ALWAYS another hay
seller. You still "have the fun" of handling the bales, if you buy the hay. I always buy extra hay, in case of
early winter, late spring, to have enough to feed until pasture is usable.

If you want a smaller cow, my several friends have a Dexter x Jersey cross, which seems to be the gold standard in
small homestead dairy animals. Gives a good amount of milk, but not to excess, good fat content, small to feed and less
impact on the land with size. You can keep the calf for meat and company for the cow until she calves again.
Most of them breed back AI, not dealing with a bull. These folks have tried the Dexters, but unless you put
them up on a stand, they are incredibly hard to milk with the short legs. My 42" shoulder height heifer hardly
had a foot of belly clearance, so you can't get a bucket under the udder. Need to be sitting on the ground
to do the milking, which is NOT a good position to be in by a cow!! The addition of Jersey to Dexter, gets
udder up on slightly longer legs, for bucket clearance, with a much larger volume of milk produced by the
crossbred cow. Still VERY economical to feed like the Dexters. I hear a lot of folks brag up their crossbred
cow, being about perfect for this home use. Of course you will have a spell when she is dry before calving
again, so you need to consider that. But two cows might be just too much to manage on a tiny place. Friends always cross the
cow back to Dexter bull, so her calf is more Dexter and ready to process at a younger age. The steers I have
seen from their cows, were READY at 14 months, on mostly grass and hay, some corn feed for a finish layer of fat.
Looked as good as the Grand Champ Steer at the local Fair, quite handsome, only small at about 700 pounds.
So not an excess amount of meat to carry over each year, with smaller families more the norm these days.

My Dexter heifer was QUITE efficient at converting grass to meat, gained over 300 pounds eating pasture in the
six months we had her. I then decided to get out of the cow business, with DD out of 4-H, so we sold her on. I
kind of miss the cattle, they kept the weeds cleaned out from under the high tensile wire fencing, so I didn't
need to weed whack them!!

I would look at the sheep more as a meat source, not so much for milk, with their short production season. Get
a small cow for milk volume. I know what you mean about goats, would choose a cow over them ANY time.
You may have to do some hunting, to find a Dexter x Jersey cross cow/heifer. Amish are breeding them, might
even be trained for hand milking. I personally, would make the investment in a milking machine, saves time on
a daily chore, as well as your hands.

 

[goodhors]

Forgot to say, your rotation for those small areas, sounds a little too long of time grazing.
If you have that many little paddocks, you may want to rotate every couple days. Waiting
four weeks to get back on, means you will need to mow and waste tall grass growth they
could be eating, Grass grows FAST. Mowing after they leave that paddock, takes off what
they don't like, won't eat ANYWAY, so NEW, tender stuff is growing while you go thru
rotation to get back to paddock 1.

Mowing regularly is VERY helpful to developing the plant root
system, growing down for food and water, instead of spending plant energy on leaf
growth. Sure makes for GOOD tough plants if weather goes bad on you. They come
back faster, stand up to rough hoof use, without dying off. My horses ripping and tearing
don't even leave torn marks in summer grass. Last year we got no rain for over 6 weeks,
had temps way up for our area, but the grass kept on growing with those DEEP roots and
having the dirt covered to prevent drying out in the sunshine. Horses had grazing all during
that time, which is severe weather for our area. I didn't mow during that time, grass never got
tall enough for that.

Kind of time consuming, to mow often, but keeps the production quality up, and not letting the
undesirable stuff grow, which they ALREADY said they didn't want to eat. Mowing often helps
keep the weeds almost non-existant in my fields, easy to see if one sneaks in so I can remove it.

My horses spend 2-4 days on one paddock, then get moved to the next one. These are fair sized
paddocks, acre and a half, to 3 acres. Usually only 3-4 horses on each paddock. Moving often,
prevents overgrazing, bald spots. Sometimes we get dry season weather, late July, August, so
I may not mow if there is no rain to make the grass shoot up. I just keep rotating the horses,
who always have plenty to eat with this system. My turf is well established, we fertilize after
soil testing, so the plants get the minerals needed for good pasture growth.

Is donkey protective enough to chase dogs? If he will protect the sheep, cow, it might be worth keeping
as insurance against predatory dogs, coyotes, should you make the hay field into paddocks or gain
the neighbors field to graze. In your story, I wasn't sure who chased who! Gives cow a friend, if
he doesn't pick on her or the sheep. Usually female donkeys are better guardians, but I do know
some nice gelded donkey guardians that liked their sheep.

 

[bonbean01]

We have 6 hair sheep...Katahdin, Dorper and Crosses..5 ewes and 1 ram...we are on a total of 6 acres here and with half of that in pasture, still have to buy hay and feed. In a few months will see lambs arriving. Also have dual purpose chickens and garden and small orchard that started producing this summer.

Do we come out ahead money wise??? Nope...do we come out health wise? Yes!!! Do we love this lifestyle??? You bet!!!

Bartering with neighbours really increases farm raised foods...recently, had tons of eggs and brought them to a neighbour...she had just baked pecan pies...she has large pecan trees...and that pie was great, and they loved farm fresh eggs! We all swap veggies around here too...not everyone is good at raising the same things.

I also don't want to eat iffy chicken from the store...know what mine eat and how they are cared for...same as lamb in the freezer, homegrown veggies and fruit.

Our goal is to break even...and enjoy this adventure!!!

Wishing you great success Bubba, and and joy in the effort!!!!

 

[bubba1358]

Thanks all. Suppose i modify this plan to have no donkey, and plan on feeding bought hay from the start of December through the end of February. I would also convert that half acre of hay field to grazing land. So 3 sheeep plus seasonal lambs, 1 cow (no calf - would be early weaned and grazed at a friend's), on 2.5 acres, rotationally grazed for 9 months, then dry lotted on hay for 3. Is that a workable plan?

PS - i should add that my local stocking rate is 1.2 steers to the acre. So 5 cows on 4 acres is the going rate.