FAQs: I currently have 160 acres across the road from an 80 I recently bought. 100 acres of the 1/4 are mostly warm season grass w/some cheat + brome. The 80 is all grass of the above species. I am in an EQUIP program to crossfence the 80 to 3 paddocks-plant the 50 acres of farmland in the 1/4 to grass and crossfence that farmland into 4 paddocks + the adjoining 100 acres in the 1/4 that are currently grass into 3 paddocks. There is a well on the 80 that will provide fresh water for the whole system with 3 2600 gallon tanks. What type of grass should I plant the farmland to? I want the most productivity for the grazing season. If I plant cool grass can I get much more grazing from it other than Spring if I go to stalks in October? I plan on planting it all to warm grass & having 3 herds of 20 cows each on the 160 acres + 80 acres. Each will have 3 paddocks to graze. I am in Thayer County. What do you advise?

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Q: I currently have 160 acres across the road from an 80 I recently bought. 100 acres of the 1/4 are mostly warm season grass w/some cheat + brome. The 80 is all grass of the above species. I am in an EQUIP program to crossfence the 80 to 3 paddocks-plant the 50 acres of farmland in the 1/4 to grass and crossfence that farmland into 4 paddocks + the adjoining 100 acres in the 1/4 that are currently grass into 3 paddocks. There is a well on the 80 that will provide fresh water for the whole system with 3 2600 gallon tanks. What type of grass should I plant the farmland to? I want the most productivity for the grazing season. If I plant cool grass can I get much more grazing from it other than Spring if I go to stalks in October? I plan on planting it all to warm grass & having 3 herds of 20 cows each on the 160 acres + 80 acres. Each will have 3 paddocks to graze. I am in Thayer County. What do you advise?

A: There would be an advantage to planting the 50 acres of cropland to a cool-season grass mix, such as orchardgrass and smooth brome with some legumes. The advantages include a quicker, easier, and cheaper establishment for the cool-seasons compared to the warm-seasons. Probably more important is that these acres of cool-season would balance the whole system for the season better. You would have more grazing forage available in late April and May and then rotate into warm-season paddocks in summer. This is assuming that existing warm-season pastures are heavily warm-season dominated. If they are more like a 50-50 or 40-60 mix of cool and warm, then separate cool-season pasture may not be as much as an issue. Another point is that many times, 3 paddocks in a rotation system is not enough to gain significant benefit. Ideally 4 or 5 would be better. For example, 2 herds with 5 paddocks each compared to 3 herds with 3 or 4 paddocks each could be better. These logistics may not work for you though. Also, 60 pairs grazing this acreage for 5 months may be pushing the stocking rate a little too high; unless there is good rainfall across the entire grazing season.

Dr. Rick Rasby, Professor of Animal Science
Animal Science, University of Nebraska - Lincoln, Lincoln, NE
August 31st, 2007

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