NCSHC April Meeting Recap - Dale Strickler on Grazing Management
The April member meeting of the NC Soil Health Coalition was held on Tuesday, April 4th. Coalition members were joined by Dale Strickler, a well-known author, farmer, and soil health consultant. Dale has worked for decades both implementing soil health practices on his own farm and teaching others about soil health related topics. Dale has written three books: The Drought Resilient Farm, Managing Pasture, and The Complete Guide to Restoring Your Soil. These books have been used by many farmers as references to improve their farming practices by reducing input costs and understanding their impact on soil health. The books are available on Amazon and through common booksellers.
Dale shared a presentation with the members that focused on the principles of rotational grazing and pasture management. He stressed the importance of seeing the land as a means to capture sunlight and rainfall instead of focusing on livestock performance or crop production alone. By maximizing sunlight and rainfall recovery, other management concerns become much easier and soil health is improved as a result. This may include using cover crops or rotational grazing to maximize vegetative growth throughout the year to increase photosynthetic activity (capturing sunlight) and water infiltration (capturing rainfall).
Dale refuted some commonly held beliefs about pasture and grazing management, such as the opinion that pastures must be grazed fully without leaving excess plant biomass behind to maintain a profit from the land. Overgrazing or removing too much plant material from a given area during a grazing period usually leads to lower production overall and increased costs for supplemental feed and inputs. Leaving sufficient above ground biomass behind allows the plants to recover from grazing more effectively. The plants are able to regrow faster for additional grazing because the root biomass and photosynthetic capacity are maintained. This provides greater grazing opportunities and improves soil quality by increasing root exudate production and maintaining cover over the soil.
Dale provided information about managing different plant species that is useful to consider at different periods throughout the year. Cool season and warm season plants do not reach the three stages of plant growth, which are vegetative, reproductive, and dormant, at the same time of year. This means that cool season plant species, such as fescue, oats, and brassicas, will be optimal for grazing at different time periods than warm season plants, such as Bermudagrass, millets, and cowpeas. The differences in cool and warm season plant growth can be overcome by maintaining pasture areas that are optimal for different plant species that can be grazed during different periods of the year or by supplementing perennial species with annuals. Dale also explained that cool and warm season grasses produce varying amounts of biomass based on water and nitrogen availability. Warm season grasses tend to be more efficient at converting water and nitrogen to plant biomass, whereas cool season grasses generally require greater water and nitrogen availability.
Dale covered a variety of other topics with the Coalition members in attendance, including the concerns associated with endophyte infested fescue and how to alleviate them, the benefits of interseeding annual species into pasture, the role of epigenetics and geographic location in viable seed production, and the benefits of microbial inoculants if they are properly selected.
Are you a farmer in North Carolina who is interested in learning more about soil health resources and joining a network of farmers across the State who are also implementing soil health practices? Join the NC Soil Health Coalition by completing the application form on our website. Sign up for membership and join us for our May meeting!
