Rotational Grazing
Rotational grazing is a livestock and pasture management methodology that aims to mimic natural grazing patterns.
The practice involves moving and containing animals through pasture to improve soil, animal, and pasture health. Pastures are divided into smaller grazing areas, grazed in a systematic rotation that manages pasture consumption. Allowing grazed pasture rest and regenerate for future grazing rotations. When managed efficiently for each farm type, rotational grazing can provide drought resistance, better pasture quality, and maximise economic benefits.
In Practice
Pasture Division: Pastures are divided into smaller sections, known as paddocks. The number of paddocks and their size can vary based on factors such as accessible grazing area, livestock type, topography and forage growth patterns.
Grazing Rotation: Livestock are rotated between paddocks according to a predetermined schedule. This rotation prevents continuous grazing pressure on any one area and allows forage to recover. It also curtails the spread of parasites and diseases that tend to accumulate when animals graze on the same pasture repeatedly.
Rest and Recovery: While one paddock is being grazed, the others are rested. Pastures require time to regenerate, allowing for forage regrowth, soil recovery, and nutrient replenishment. Rest periods can range from days to weeks, depending on factors such as forage type, growth rate and climatic or seasonal conditions.
Monitoring and Adjustment: Successful rotational grazing requires ongoing monitoring and adaptive pasture allocation. Farmers observe livestock behaviour, pasture growth, and forage quality. They adjust the rotation schedule based on weather conditions, forage availability, and animal requirements.
Portable Electric Fencing: By utilizing electric fencing systems, pasture is effectively divided into smaller paddocks for rotational grazing. This fencing solution provides a cost-effective means to create paddock divisions and manage livestock movement, addressing the challenge of infrastructure investment.
Adaptive Multi-paddock Grazing: While often used interchangeably with rotational grazing, adaptive multi-paddock (AMP) grazing involves livestock being moved through smaller paddocks for short periods, giving the grass longer recovery times. This prevents overgrazing and keeps the soil covered, which reduces erosion.
Key Benefits
- Pasture growth: Allows pasture to rest, and regrow, allowing for more grazing sessions to occur on the pasture, and potentially increasing the grazing season.
- Soil health: Rotational grazing allows for a range of plant species to thrive. Increased biodiversity supports healthy soil microbial communities and nutrient cycling. This increases the quality of the pasture, offering better quality feed for cattle.
- Drought resilience: Well-managed pastures have better water retention and infiltration. Increased water availability comes from rotational grazing, which improves plant cover, soil structure, water infiltration, and water storage while reducing water evaporation and soil temperature. Even a 1% increase in organic matter can store an impressive 27,000 additional gallons of water per acre.
- Disease Management: Rotating livestock between paddocks frequently assists in disrupting the lifecycle of parasites and pathogens which can accumulate in one area. This helps to reduce parasites and disease transmission between animals.
- Flexibility and Adaptation: Rotational grazing is adaptable to various contexts. Farmers can modify rotation schedules based on changing weather patterns, livestock needs, and seasonal variations in forage growth. Flexibility is essential to optimize grazing outcomes.
- Nutritional Quality: Research has shown that rotational grazing promotes healthier pastures by allowing forage plants to recover, leading to enhanced nutritional quality of the forage, resulting in better feed for livestock.
- Increased Meat production: A study by the University of Georgia found that a twelve-paddock system with cattle rotated every two days resulted in a 38% higher stocking rate, 37% higher calf gain per acre, and 31% less hay fed per cow. With the potential to increase the carrying capacity of your farm by 69%, these are significant improvements and cost savings.
- Increased Labor: Frequently moving livestock and establishing fencing can be more labour-intensive than other grazing methods.
- High investment costs: Implementing rotational grazing often requires initial investment to set up fencing and the establishment of water systems in each paddock.
- Management and planning: Implementing rotational grazing requires significant planning and management. When first making the switch, there will be an adaption period where management decisions will be crucial for the health of cattle, pasture, and profits.
- Soil degradation: If rotational grazing is planned insufficiently then overgrazing, soil compaction, and insufficient recovery time can occur. This will result in soil degradation and potential reduced pasture quality.
- Adaptation to Climate: Effectively adjusting the rotation schedule based on changing weather patterns requires flexibility and adaptability, rotation planning, and management techniques.
Case Study: Tracking Y Ranch
Tracking Y Ranch in Washington State, USA, has incorporated rotational and adaptive grazing into their farming practices. They say these practices are crucial for optimizing land use and improving livestock management. These methods are crucial for the ranch to maintain pasture quality while promoting animal health and performance. They highlight the importance of adjusting pasture allocation according to animals' nutritional needs and seasonal conditions to ensure both pasture longevity and livestock well-being.
βIt's been great because the small paddock moves allow us to increase daily gains on our cattle over the whole grazing season. Keeping them in smaller paddocks allows us to keep a closer eye on those animals as they go along, and because we're controlling when the cattle end up moving and coming off areas, we can make sure that our cattle target and graze different species that they may not like such as rushes and sedges in our Wetland areas as they dry out.β
β Jake, Tracking Y Ranch.
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