Farming '91, 1991-03-20, Page 14A14. FARMING ’91, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 20, 1991
Farming '91
Intensive pasturing requires little extra time
Continued from page A12
ture. The only time involved is
checking the pasture and deciding
when the cattle should be moved
and moving them. Four thousand
feet of plastic water pipe serves the
19 paddocks on the farm and a
water trough is hauled by ATV
from one pasture to the next. The
cattle are happy to be out on grass,
John says. When they see him
coming and know they’re going to
be moved to a lush new pasture,
they often roll over in pleasure.
Moving the cattle also helps him
keep on top of health problems,
John says. Healthy animals move
quickly to the new pasture while a
sick animal will follow more slowly.
He can quickly move to give
medication if needed.
Aside from the fencing and the
waterlines the input costs for
intensive pasturing are very low,
John says. He has very little
equipment using his tractor and a
mower to clip the pastures and an
old baler which he uses to bring in
hay early in the rotation each
spring.
Learning how to make the most
of the pasture takes more know
Course offers advanced
leadership training
Shirley Hazlitt, RR 4, Goderich
attended the Advanced Agricul
tural Leadership Program (AALP)
seminar in Kingston, Ontario from
January 28 to 30.
Participants in the leadership
program studied management of
media issues. “The media is a
major player of influence in deci
sion making today,” said Roy
Maxwell, Communications Officer
with the Ontario Chicken Pro
ducer’s Marketing Board. “You
must learn the media rules and
understand the urban audience
that the media caters to,” he told
the group of 30 young men and
women.
“The media is, whether you like
it or not, the leader of opinion in
this country,” said Paul Meldrum,
a journalist and dairy farmer and a
graduate of the Advanced Agricul
tural Leadership Program.
“Avoid jargon. Use words that
your audience can understand,”
ledge than what John calls
“recipe” farming where all the
inputs are controlled. It takes a
while to get onto the rotation
principle. In the spring, when all
the pasture is growing at once, he
sets aside about one quarter to one
third of the fields for hay. The other
14 paddocks are used for a high
speed rotation with each being
pastured for one day to get rid of
the heads forming on the stocks.
The hay is taken off early, around
June 1 so that the plants have a
chance for regrowth before the heat
of summer hits. It means that when
growth slows in the pastures, all 19
paddocks will be available for the
cattie.
After the first growth spurt, a
36-37 day rotation is established so
the pastures have plenty of time to
recover. A secret of high intensity
pasturing, John says, is in the rest
period the grass gets between
pasturing. If pasture is grazed too
closely it will take longer to
recover. He likes to leave three or
four inches of ground cover on a
pasture when the cattle are moved
off. The leaf surface develops more
energy from the sun and puts less
advised Susan White, Professor of
Print Journalism at Loyalist Col
lege. “Many readers don’t know
what OMAF (Ontario Ministryh of
Ariculture and Food) stands for or
what quota is,” she added. White
then asked each participant to write
a press release. The results were
critiqued by White and two other
Loyalist College faculty members.
Other topics covered during the
three-day program included ethics
and negotiating skills.
AALP participants will travel to
China in March to continue their
training in leadership skills and
understanding international agri
cultural issues. Their formal stud
ies conclude in Stratford and St.
Marys with a three-day session in
April.
Deadline for application to the
next Advanced Agricultural
Leadership Program is April 30,
1991. For information contact Exe
cutive Director, Patricia Mighton at
519-767-3503.
stress on the root system of the
plant to start from scratch allowing
the pasture to recover more quick
ly. That three or four inches is also
a hedge against drought. If needed
the cattle can always be turned mto
the field.
After the cattle move off each
pasture he clips it to make sure
seed heads don’t form since when
the seed is formed the plant thinks
it has done its job for the year and
stops growing. He also applies
fertilizer to stimulate regrowth.
This year he’ll experiment with a
second fertilizer application to see
if he can further boost gains on the
cattle. He anticipates it will in
crease his costs to $30 an acre.
In August, as summer heat slows
growth he starts supplementing the
cattle’s feed with the hay he has
taken off the fields in the spring.
The hay also helps provide fibre.
He likes to get the cattle off the
pastures by the end of September
or early October so that the pasture
has a chance to put on good growth
before winter. Come spring he
finds his pastures green up before
most of the conventional pastures
in the area.
The bonus is that the cattle
spread their own manure across the
fields meaning there is no manure
handling to be done. It helps build
up the soil and the earth worm
population on the farm is high. In
fact, it has become a significant
source of extra income. He has a
contract with wormpickers who
come after every rain, about 25
nights a year. The pickers have
commented on how large the
worms are on the farm, he says.
Financially, he says, pasturing
and his custom service make sense.
He is paid 40 cents per pound of
gain. On average the 179 head of
cattle gained 240 pounds, with a
provision for four per cent shrink
before and four per cent after. It
averaged out to 307.7 lbs. of gain
per acre which worked out to
$123.08 an acre or a return of $96
per head.
The wormpickers bring in anoth
er $28.57 per acre for a total of
$4,000. It means a gross income of
more than $151 per acre.
Cash costs include $1,200 for the
rental of the additional pasture or
$8.57 per acre spread over the
whole pasture. Fertilizer amounts
to $21.41 per acre and there is $2
per acre for salt and minerals, $4
for machinery and fuel costs for
clipping, $5 for water and hydro,
and $1 for medication for a total
cash cost of $41.97 leaving a net of
$109.48 per acre, not counting
fixed costs of the farm. The system
works well for them partly because
they haven’t a large mortgage to
pay on the farm. Still, John says,
there isn’t a cheaper way for a
farmer to get a return on his
investment.
The pasture needs very little
maintenance once it is established.
When he took over the 50 acres of
rented land it was little more than
strawberry plants. He frost-seeded
the field with white dutch and red
clover. Also important in the
pasture is orchard grass. A benefit
of orchard grass over other grasses
is that once the head is nipped off,
it won’t try to produce another
head for the season. Cattle help the
regeneration of the pasture with
natural reseeding, eating seeds
and distributing them through the
manure.
The family is very concerned
with the environment to the point
that John fences off the fencerows
to keep the cattle out. Part of that is
practical, he says, because the
cattle tend to congregate under
trees and over-fertilize the soil
there while starving the rest of the
field. Although he doesn’t take
down trees that exist, shade trees
aren’t really necessary on all but a
few days of the year, he said, and
can cause problems with this
imbalance in the spreading of the
manure.
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Farming for the Hoonaards is
very much a way of life as well as a
business. “This is a real fun job”
John says of looking after the
cattle. The time spent moving
cattle or moving the water tank is
an enjoyable time, outside with the
cattle in the green fields.
And one of the advantages of the
system is that there is little enough
time taken up looking after the
cattle to leave plenty of time for
doing other things. John currently
is starting a part-time business in
his workshop to build sashes for
barns.
“We like to be self-sufficient”
Jenny adds. They use their own
wood for heating, keep a dairy cow
and grow a large garden to help
feed their family of five children.
They keep a flock of 500 laying
hens and their family’s egg supply
comes from the cracked eggs that
wouldn’t sell anyway. Jenny likes
to sew and sews much of the family
clothing. Jenny says she could be
out working, earning a good cash
income as a Registered Nursing
Assistant but she chose to stay
home. She feels she contributes
significantly to the family income
with the work she does at home.
“The biggest asset farmers have
is non-cash income,” John says.
He figures they have a non-cash
income of $10,000 in the savings
they make through their sense of
self-sufficiency. He estimates that
a dollar saved is worth three dollars
earned because there isn’t any
taxes to pay on it. “We have a
family of seven and we eat well,”
he says.
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