Plentiful, reliable, good quality water is essential for grazing livestock. Without good water, it doesn't matter how effective other grazing management practices might be.

But how important is location of that water? Think about how water sites influence the grazing behavior of your livestock. And how this might affect both pasture and animal performance.

Animals resist traveling far from water. They rarely graze more than a half mile away from water in rough country or a mile away on flat land. Under 1000 feet is the ideal. If they must travel far for water, they spend less time grazing, they burn off pounds walking, and they graze distant areas incompletely.

Poor water distribution also causes transfer of nutrients when animals graze one area and then drink a long distance from where they graze. Manure and urine are deposited near watering sites or along the path to water. The nitrogen, phosphorus, and other nutrients in these deposits are concentrated and wasted in an area with little grass. Distributing this manure and urine more evenly would grow more grass.

How can you improve your water distribution? More ponds, windmills, wells, and dugouts might help. My preference, though, is to use a pipeline. They can be put almost anywhere. And water lines are less expensive than most folks think. Most areas can get pipe and frost-proof trenching for less than 1 dollar/ft.

And over time, they pay for themselves with better grass and improved animal performance.