Now, how do I feel about it? I love it! Rain waters my grass. Managing the cows properly will also result in timely planting of future seed. Since my grass this year shot to the reproductive stage in May before I could graze it, a lot of grass went to seed. Utilizing high-density grazing, my first time through the paddocks with the cows resulted in a lot of grass seed being planting in moist soil with cattle hooves. As I’ve said before, I strive to organize the grazing paddocks so that the cows have enough to eat for one day or less plus trample at least half of the forage available. That trampling effect lays a layer of grass down as mulch and future organic matter, plus shakes loose all the grass seed ready to increase my grass sward.

I believe that years like this can help focus the debate. We grow way too much corn and soybeans in Iowa. We use way to much questionable hilly erodible ground for row crops, when those areas should be planted to grass or some long-term perennial that will hold the topsoil. The more grass we plant and the more focus we have in managing animals in such a way as to create more topsoil, the more water we’ll hold, the less floods we’ll have, as well as minimizing drought.

1. In nature the overriding principle is diversity – which creates stable ecosystems. The more diversity on my farm, the more stable and resistant to weather shocks (like drought, rain, etc).

2. Cattle and sheep are dead-end hosts for each other’s parasites. The cattle suck up a lot of sheep parasites in their grazing rotation, which help lessen the load in the sheep as they come behind and graze after the cows. The opposite is true with the sheep grazing and cattle parasites.  Every little bit helps.

3. Sheep and cows eat different plants – thus utilizing more available forage and allowing for more animals (albeit different species) to graze ( and increasing farm income, btw). The key to grazing, however, is time of exposure and return. What I mean by this is the initial exposure of the plants to grazing pressure, how long the plants are exposed, and how long does the plant have to recover before being exposed to grazing pressure again.

Ultimately I’d like to have chickens, goats and maybe even pigs in my rotation. This would help diversify my operation even further, encourage different forages to grow, and focus my efforts on maximizing the farm’s potential as a revenue source without compromising my ecological goals.

What I mean by low-labor is cutting out much of the work in raising sheep (and animals, for that matter). I have a hair-type sheep breed (St. Croix), so no shearing. I don’t clip their hooves, I don’t dock their tails, I don’t worm them (they are parasite-resistant), I don’t feed them grain, I don’t help them with their lambing, I don’t call the vet out for every issue. While some may consider this inhumane, I consider it a program of restoration.  Restoration in this instance and in my opinion is getting farm animals back to a status of health and productivity without a lot of human intervention and cost. I always ask myself: “If I wasn’t here, what would they do”? The truth is, wild sheep do quite well. Somehow they manage to live without worming, tail docking, hoof clipping, lots of grain, barns, and lambing assistance. Those that can’t adapt, die — and don’t pass on those genetics that won’t thrive in that environment.

Now, I know I’m generalizing. There are always specific instances where my broad-sweeping statements don’t apply. HOWEVER — all I know for sure is once I got my genetics right and my mindset right, my sheep herd thrived. I breed them in December for a May lambing. This means their third tri-mester finds them on grass (late March into April) right when their nutritional needs are the greatest. They give birth on grass during a time when it’s not too hot, the grass is growing. The lambs that I’m setting aside for my meat sales will finish in November, right when the grass is not growing (and I don’t have to feed hay).  These sheep came from a parasite resistant flock in the same climatic zone that I live in, so they are geared to thrive in humid environments (sheep traditionally have been raised in dry, cool, arid climates).  If a ewe or ram doesn’t do well in my program, I sell her or him. I’m ruthless with this, because if I’m sympathetic and introduce a lot of medication or labor, then eventually I won’t have a low-labor sheep herd.

The greatest part about these sheep is that they will graze the dead grass in winter, and dig down through the snow and ice to eat it. I didn’t feed any hay last year, and we had a very hard winter. The sheep stayed outside, ate grass all winter, and thrived. That mean their manure and urine was deposited on the pasture, not in the barn (where I would have to clean it up, put it in the manure spreader, and take it out myself).  Interestingly enough, so many people thought I was crazy to not feed hay. They almost got angry at how I was such a bad shepherd.  In looking at my sheep now, I’m amazed at how healthy they look, their lambs are fat and growing, the ewes are contented.

Bottom line: since they graze during the winter, I don’t have to make or buy hay (reduction in diesel fuel, equipment repairs, capital expenses). I don’t have to haul manure (reduction in my time spent cleaning, diesel fuel for tractor to pull manure spreader, equipment repairs, capital expenses).  I don’t have to put up expensive buildings to house the sheep as my herd grows (reduction in capital expenses).  Diesel fuel is the life blood of US agriculture – cut that off and the farm economy comes to a screeching halt. One of my goals is to create a farming system that approximates low labor, little to no reliance on diesel fuel, environmentally-sustaining and economically viable.

So far, so good.

Well, times are changing. While I’m not against large farms, I personally do expect organic livestock operations to adhere to a pasture-based system. If a large farm can pull that off, then more power to them. It’s hard though. Pasture means land, and land can be expensive in certain areas. There is a reason that dairy in general is concentrated in areas such as the Upper Midwest, New England and parts of the Mid-Atlantic, and the Pacific Northwest — due to the climate. Those areas can be built up commercially, and land can be difficult to obtain in the amounts necessary to run a viable operation.

Here in Kalona, Iowa there is a large Amish/Mennonite community. While some Amish communities focus on other businesses, the Kalona  Amish “business” is an organic farm, with a focus on organic dairy.   These are not large farms, but there is enough land to generally support a large family.  However, with the new pasture rule out, these dairies don’t necessarily have enough land to meet the requirement for all their animals (that’s a change in the new rule).  And here is where I come in — I’m offering to custom graze their calves and replacement heifers during the growing season to free up pasture for their main milking herds. It’s a great partnership, and helpful to me as well as I’m converting all of my 60 acres to pasture.

The next blog post will be focused on the rudiments of grazing animals.

Hair sheep grazing through snow

It’s now the end of February, and I’ve fed very little hay. It’s amazing to see the sheep dig down through the snow and eat the grass. When one thinks about it, stockpiled grass (grass that was allowed to grow during the fall without cutting for hay or allowed to be grazed) is in fact “standing hay”. The idea is to have the animal go out there and harvest the feed themselves, not us humans spending a huge amount of money, time, effort and energy harvesting the hay and bringing it to the animal. Much less costly, much less effort, and the animal is healthier I believe, in the end.

This is our first year on our home pastures, and I’ve been working overtime putting in our perimter fence along with the electrical part. We use electric fencing to control our grazing, and believe it or not there is a lot of preparation and installation that goes into installing a charged fence properly. Compounding the issue has been simultaneous wet weather, lambing, planting and a host of pressing spring jobs. However, we are rotating our sheep and horses every 2 days, and it’s great to see the response of the grass to grazing pressue.

Our goal is to eventually minimize and possibly eliminate hay feeding in the winter. Right now, I would settle for extending the season in fall to late December, and starting back up in late February. I still can’t see how our sheep would bust through the ice to eat stockpiled grasses, but I could be wrong.

Lots of wet weather lately, and hay making has been an extremely difficult excercise in futility. But, all is not lost and we have much to be thankful for.