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Southwest Missouri | We "stockpile" fescue for winter feeding. That means we leave some pastures alone and let the grass grow up. Supposedly, fescue grass will retain most of its food value into the winter. If the grass is tall, the cows can burrow to it even in snow.
When the grass is gone, we dry lot the cows on a 15 acre field that we chisel plow in the spring and plant to milo, soybeans or whatever fits our rotation.
Many people unroll bales onto the turf. That has benefits of keeping the manure out in the pastures and not killing the grass like you can if you put a feeder in the same place on turf. You just unroll onto a different spot each time you feed.
While many people do it, I am not a fan. I do not like to put hay where the cows lay on it, walk on it and defecate and urinate on it. If you have poor quality hay, then maybe. I like to think we have pretty good grass hay and I think there is less waste if I use covered feeders and then plow up the field each spring.
This is just what we do here. | |
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rotational grazing
