Simply Sheep

[Beekissed]

We have 8 acres. We probably have an acre open for the yard. There is a 70'x100' fenced garden. there is a 60'x60' pig pen. The horses have about 2 1/2 or 3 acres that was heavily wooded before we had it forestry mulched. We'll be working on it this winter, getting it ready for planting grass. There is 3 pastures for the sheep, also half wooded. My husband fights me tooth and toenail over cutting trees. He loves the trees, but then gripes over the cost of feeding the animals. We struck a happy medium on the forestry mulching-that took out a lot of small trees, he still has the big ones. there is the pipeline pasture, we had the back corner forestry mulched on the other side of the pipeline. There is still a strip of heavy forest on the other side of the pipeline that we left.

Hmmmmm......I wonder, if you could combine your separate herds, if you could "mob" graze your acreage so as to create better pasture for all without all the tilling, seeding, fertilizing and such. That's how they are reclaiming desert in Africa and turning it back to grassland....they just increase stocking density by decreasing paddock size and then moving the stock daily. Over there they use herdmen, but here they use poly wire and portable reels to create a "predator" that moves the stock along.

That's what we'll be doing here to develop better grasses. It sounds counterintuitive to increase stocking density/rates but it's actually producing grass better when done that way. I so wish you could watch videos.....it's nothing short of miraculous what folks are doing with this intensive grazing/management. The befores and afters are remarkable and none of it done by planting any seed.

They are even developing silvopasture in their woodlands by thinning the woods, putting sheep through to eat the sprouts, pigs through to churn up the soils a bit, then rolling out hay for the cattle there....it gets eaten, trampled, fertilized by manure and urine, and then good things grow.

It would be a cool thing to try, even on 8 acres. I'm trying it on 3 acres and am also going to thin our woods to expand that pasture into the remaining 15 acres here, which is entirely wood land except for a road to the back portion of the land.

There are folks doing this on a single acre with one cow on a rope, moving her daily, to create periods of grazing, trampling and then resting of the pasture. It's as old as time but seems to be the "new" thing and it's working...it's working to restore the soils, the pasture, the grass, the variety of species, etc.

 

[flowerbug]

Hmmmmm......I wonder, if you could combine your separate herds, if you could "mob" graze your acreage so as to create better pasture for all without all the tilling, seeding, fertilizing and such. That's how they are reclaiming desert in Africa and turning it back to grassland....they just increase stocking density by decreasing paddock size and then moving the stock daily. Over there they use herdmen, but here they use poly wire and portable reels to create a "predator" that moves the stock along.

That's what we'll be doing here to develop better grasses. It sounds counterintuitive to increase stocking density/rates but it's actually producing grass better when done that way. I so wish you could watch videos.....it's nothing short of miraculous what folks are doing with this intensive grazing/management. The befores and afters are remarkable and none of it done by planting any seed.

They are even developing silvopasture in their woodlands by thinning the woods, putting sheep through to eat the sprouts, pigs through to churn up the soils a bit, then rolling out hay for the cattle there....it gets eaten, trampled, fertilized by manure and urine, and then good things grow.

It would be a cool thing to try, even on 8 acres. I'm trying it on 3 acres and am also going to thin our woods to expand that pasture into the remaining 15 acres here, which is entirely wood land except for a road to the back portion of the land.

There are folks doing this on a single acre with one cow on a rope, moving her daily, to create periods of grazing, trampling and then resting of the pasture. It's as old as time but seems to be the "new" thing and it's working...it's working to restore the soils, the pasture, the grass, the variety of species, etc.

it does look and sound really good until someone gets greedy and overstocks or there is a drought, fire or a war or something which interrupts the system. i love the ideas of it all, but you can see that to restore some areas it does take fences and keeping animals out so that trees can recover. otherwise the hungry goats will strip the trees of bark.

i much prefer working with nature, and sometime nature says, hey, leave this part wild please.

the challenge is to find native grasses that can survive a variety of circumstances.

 

[Beekissed]

it does look and sound really good until someone gets greedy and overstocks or there is a drought, fire or a war or something which interrupts the system. i love the ideas of it all, but you can see that to restore some areas it does take fences and keeping animals out so that trees can recover. otherwise the hungry goats will strip the trees of bark.

i much prefer working with nature, and sometime nature says, hey, leave this part wild please.

the challenge is to find native grasses that can survive a variety of circumstances.

Uh....have you even watched any of those videos, FB? They don't allow the animals to strip the trees and no one is overstocking anything. They are managing their stocking rates and density to suit the land, giving it suitable rest periods so as to encourage growth and restoration of the soils and species growing there. They aren't stealing habitat, they are building it and making it even better for the wild creatures living there. Their methods are retaining more soil structure, more biodensity and more water retention on the land and soils so that drought is not an issue and fires less prevalent. Need to watch the videos.

 

[Lazy Gardener]

It all depends on how you choose to manage your land, and what your vision is for it. Left alone, my land grows up to trash trees, brambles, perennial weeds that no animal will eat. So... I will not leave my land to let it go wild.

As for greed, the method that Bee is suggesting is the absolute opposite of greed. It is proper land and animal management to result in the greatest benefit for both. Good stewardship of land and animal resources requires constant assessment and decisions based on weather patterns and soil/crop/animal response. The type of land management Bee is recommending works to protect the land from both drought and fire, while building the soil, and improving the mix of plant species. Native grasses? This system promotes that. Land that is managed this way results in return of native grass species that have not been seen for decades, if not centuries. As for war, can any of us prevent that based on how we graze our land? Animals stripping bark? Again... good stewardship prevents that. Under the type of land management Bee mentions, young trees would be fenced off from hungry mouths. And, goats are usually not part of this herd rotation.

Greed is what we see in our current mega ag method of growing food. Grains grown in monoculture on soil that has been blasted with herbicides and insecticides, then blasted again with fertilizers b/c the former have killed all the soil life. Those monoculture grains are then blasted with glyphosphate to cause all the seed heads to ripen at the same time so that grain can be harvested and shipped long distances to feed lots where animals are grown in filth and overcrowding, all so that the consumer can go to the grocer and buy pretty little cello packages at crazy cheap prices.

 

[flowerbug]

Uh....have you even watched any of those videos, FB? They don't allow the animals to strip the trees and no one is overstocking anything. They are managing their stocking rates and density to suit the land, giving it suitable rest periods so as to encourage growth and restoration of the soils and species growing there. They aren't stealing habitat, they are building it and making it even better for the wild creatures living there. Their methods are retaining more soil structure, more biodensity and more water retention on the land and soils so that drought is not an issue and fires less prevalent. Need to watch the videos.

yes, i have, i've been watching such videos (and a lot of others) for plenty of years. i am a pretty big supporter of sustainable living and restorative techniques, replanting forests and the like. i've studied these types of things most of my life and i live it myself within what i do here as best i can.

you are seeing videos of such things during times of the camera operators and the times when observers are there. over the longer term you need to see what happens when drought, fires, wars come along. are enough people left with the knowledge needed to keep the system diverse and in good condition or will it keep reverting to people exploiting the area until it is degraded again? right now my intuition is that human greed and overpopulation are both very hard things to fight against and most people don't care enough to change so we are still going to be sliding backwards more than going forwards. i would love this all to be different, but as of yet i'm just not sure that enough people are willing to put their lives on the line for what is sustainable over the future.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I think intensive pasture management can work - in a perfect world. Alas...things don't always work out that way. Stuff happens....

 

[Lazy Gardener]

So, are you saying that we shouldn't improve what we have now, because... some time in the future, someone will exploit it? Putting lives on the line? I really don't understand that statement either. How is managing land in a sustainable manner going to jeopardize any one's life? If anything, it will improve our national food chain. This method produces grass raised beef on land that is not profitable for mega-ag. And, it also rejuvinates land that has been raped by mega-ag.

As for the videos: they present before and after pics. You can't produce a video that presents the best day snapshot of a farm without it presenting the long term results. Fat and well fed cows, and lush pasture don't magically appear for the single day of filming. They are the result of long term good stewardship practices. These practices are working well, world wide at reversal of desertification. Recent documentaries show how desertification is being reversed in third world countries where starvation and disease are rampant: Whole villages of folks not able to grow enough to feed themselves. Dependent on meager government hand outs. By adopting mob/rotational grazing, the land is rejuvinated. They are now able to grow lush gardens, where before there was nothing but barren sand. Other documentaries: one I recall from Australia show airplane views of land which is managed with rotational pastures/mob grazing in comparison to the old standard method of running a herd of cattle or sheep on a large tract of land. The former aerial shot shows entire land holding which is GREEN, with a creek full of water (prior to change in stewardship practices, that creek bed was dry unless it was raging with flood water which stripped what remained of the sandy soil). Meanwhile, the adjacent tract of land with same waterfall is completely brown. Again, the photos show the proof. Do the same old, same old... and the results will be the same. Compare that to responsible land management, and the contrast is astounding.

 

[Beekissed]

Couldn't have said that better, @Lazy Gardener !!! Do nothing and let the current status quo, which isn't working and hasn't worked for a long time, or start good soil and land management......hmmmmmmmm.....the decision for me is pretty easy.

you are seeing videos of such things during times of the camera operators and the times when observers are there. over the longer term you need to see what happens when drought, fires, wars come along. are enough people left with the knowledge needed to keep the system diverse and in good condition or will it keep reverting to people exploiting the area until it is degraded again? right now my intuition is that human greed and overpopulation are both very hard things to fight against and most people don't care enough to change so we are still going to be sliding backwards more than going forwards. i would love this all to be different, but as of yet i'm just not sure that enough people are willing to put their lives on the line for what is sustainable over the future.

As with anything else....money drives the bus. If the more sustainable practices are making them money~and they most decidedly ARE~then sustainability will win in the end. Right now, more than ever, grass fed meats are coming into a prime market environment....believe it or not, driven by one thing~keto diet. Yep, the American craze for dieting has turned a whole market around. For the first time ever I'm seeing grass fed, organic beef for sale at Sam's Club.

Money talks and the more small farmers or mid size farmers see others of their ilk being able to profit enough to keep afloat in the face of increasingly prevalent industrial farming, they will jump on board. If not, they will finally phase out and that clears the chess board for the big players~industrial vs. sustainable farming.

What we do in our backyards can be called sustainable, if we want to call it that, but I doubt very seriously if it is....if you have to water the land, it's not sustainable. If you have to import fertilizer or use machines to cut grass or material for mulch, it's not sustainable. If you have to use anything manufactured by an outside source to suppress weeds, retain moisture, kill pests...it's not sustainable.

I think many mistaken the term sustainable...it's become a catch word for anyone gardening or raising a hand full of small animals in their back yard. None of that is truly sustainable, not if you are buying them food or having to water and feed a garden with things not already on your land.

Even electric fencing to move livestock is not truly sustainable.....using herders, dogs, horses, etc.....that's more sustainable as long as their is life on the Earth.

But to disdain a whole group of farmers for farming in a sustainable manner and saying it's all smoke and mirrors? That's an extremely closed mind.

Greed and destruction? That's the state of this fallen world and it's not going away. It will indeed worsen and there is nothing truly sustainable by man's power alone. But those not adding to it and trying to give back and be good stewards of the land? They are redeeming their time wisely, no matter that all the Earth will burn up in the end. A person can be a part of the forward motion of evil, they can push against it or they can sit back and critique both parties. I prefer to be on the side of the pushers. A person has to start somewhere.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Another point of view:

A Skeptical Look at Mob Grazing

Mob grazing is attracting a lot of attention lately, especially among people who are fans of other intensive rotational grazing systems. Usually, mob grazing is an extreme form of rotational grazi…

prairieecologist.com

 

[frustratedearthmother]

so that the consumer can go to the grocer and buy pretty little cello packages at crazy cheap prices.

Sad - but some people don't have any choice but to go to the grocer and buy pretty little cello packages at crazy cheap prices. I wish everyone were in charge of at least some form of food production for themselves...but it doesn't always work out that way.