We have been learning a lot about soil health lately. Specifically we are learning how to better apply the five principles of soil health to our farmland:

1. Keep the ground covered

2. Minimize soil disturbance

3. Increase plant diversity

4. Have living roots for as much of the year as possible

5. Integrate livestock

Derek has been growing winter cover crops in the corn and soybeans fields for many years, but this year we decided to use cover crops to increase the diversity and biomass in our pastures! This project started last fall when Derek used a no-till drill to plant cereal rye, hairy vetch, austrian winter peas, and crimson clover directly into one third of our existing grass pasture.

Honestly, it looked like a complete failure for most of the winter, but in March, when the days began to get a little warmer and a little longer, the new plants began to grow! There was a lot of variability, but the additional species undoubtedly improved the density and biomass in our pastures.

All this additional forage gave us an awesome opportunity to try some of the new pasture management techniques we have been learning about.

Increase Stock Density - Stock density is a measure of how many pounds of animals are on a specific piece of land for a set period of time. To increase stock density, we use temporary electric fence to decrease the amount of pasture the herd can access. By concentrating our animals in a small area and moving them everyday, we can accomplish several important goals. Our herd is healthier because they get a fresh and consistent diet everyday. Our plants are healthier because there is more uniform distribution of manure and the cows are more likely to eat all the plants, not just their favorites. Our soil is healthier because the herd will trample more of the forage down to the ground. This forage “mat” acts like mulch, keeping the soil cool and moist and giving the beneficial bugs in the soil a reliable food source. Another powerful benefit to moving our herd daily is the increased rest time that it allows for the remaining pasture.

Increase Rest Time - Rest time is the amount of time a plant has to recover in between grazing events. If a cow takes a bite of grass that has never been grazed, the grass will respond positively by jump starting growth. During that recovery phase, the plant is particularly vulnerable. If it is grazed again before it has fully recovered, the plant will struggle and perform poorly. If it is allowed to fully recover, it will respond positively to grazing and continue to be healthy and highly productive.

Here’s an example of these principles in action:

During the month of May, one of our pastures had an average of 21.4 days of rest before grazing and required a 1.5 acre section for our herd everyday. A different pasture had an average of 55.7 days of rest and required only 0.8 acres per day. We quickly realized the power of resting our pastures and we have tried to maximize rest time ever since!

Now back to the winter cover crop... We gave the pasture that had been interseeded with winter cover crops a minimum of 45 days rest, then put up a single strand of temporary fence and turned them in! We quickly learned to look over them before moving the fence because once they entered the jungle, you wouldn’t find them again until they had eaten it or trampled it to the ground.

The best winter annual stand was in one slice of our wagon wheel rotation system. I’m not sure why this section grew so much better than the others, but it was really incredible to see! The cover crops grew 5 ft tall and so thick you could barely walk through it. It made for a great Mother’s Day photoshoot!

About this time, we also learned that hairy vetch can be toxic to some cattle. We decided the best course of action would be to let the vetch mature and dry down so the herd would be very unlikely to eat it.

On June 10th, the cover crop had matured and it was finally time to graze and trample it. We used temporary electric fence to create tiny sections for the whole herd to graze at once. Because we wanted to achieve very high density on this part of the pasture, we decided to move the herd every 12 hours. We intentionally grazed this section much harder than we normally would. Our goal was to stress and setback the existing grass to give our next idea a chance to establish. When the herd had completed their work, the pasture looked completely different (see picture below). On July 5th, we drilled pearl millet and cowpeas directly into the trampled forage mat.

Then we waited for it to rain… June was exceptionally dry and our newly planted seeds needed rain to get started. Finally, it did rain and we began to see our summer cover crop growing up through the trampled grass.

There have been times I would have called our summer cover crop experiment a failure also. There are places where nothing came up and places where it is thick and tall. I have noticed that the summer annuals came up best where the existing grass stand was poor. Of course, this makes sense and encourages me, because this is exactly the areas that will most benefit from the increased biomass and diversity.

On August 15th, we began grazing our summer annuals. They are patchy and variable, but I very am grateful to have the additional forage while the existing grass gets dry and crunchy again. Hopefully, we will receive more rain soon. In the meantime, I love watching the cows trot to the summer annual patches and dig in! Their manure is fertilizing these lesser spots in our pasture and their hooves are grinding the plant matter into the topsoil. Over time, this will increase our organic matter and soil fertility.

It’s too soon to say what kind of financial impact our pasture cover crops will have on our bottom line. We definitely want to plant winter cover crops again this fall, and we may use summer cover crops to enhance areas with poor soil. Overall, it has been a fun and exciting experiment that has given us the opportunity to learn about our soils and practice the soil health principles!

We want to say a huge thank you to our friends Brad and Emalee Buttrey, BERG Livestock, for educating and encouraging us throughout this process!