To learn more about Nick and his farm, visit, https://www.facebook.com/WaukaMeadowsFarm. For fun, i wanted to check the cow days per acre grazing with the total grazing situation on a tiny portion of my farm. Polyface Farms and its farmer, the now-famous grass farmer, author and food activist Joel Salatin of Virginia, was featured in Food, Inc. Nick was completely drawn to Salatin’s no-nonsense practical approach to sustainable farming through rotational grazing, and did everything he could to learn Salatin’s system and implement it on his land. 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Click on the warnin… One acre has 4840 sq yards per acre. “To get half the cow-days per acre and poorer-quality feed [than if it were put in a bale] isn’t best, unless it’s native pasture in terrain you can’t hay,” he says. This is in addition to what he produces from his sheep, meat birds and laying hens. By the calculations, there are 61 days of grazing for one cow grazing one acre (1600 lbs DM ÷ 26 lbs = 61 days). Rose area over five years on 1400 lbs cows indicated an approximate average of 250 cow days per acre. He had raised animals on a hobby farm before, but used conventional methods. “To get half the cow days per acre, and poorer quality feed just doesn’t work anymore, unless it’s native pasture in terrain you can’t hay.” Some land gives you no other option than to graze it, but with land where you can put up a decent crop it often makes more … “When my mother got cancer, we started researching why everybody was getting cancer," Nick says. Nick uses a mobile chicken coop in his fields (known as an “egg-mobile”) with a removable floor. But they key is to move them every day.”. December 14, 2020 - by Wandi - Leave a Comment. Grass-fed, pasture-raised, or pastured beef has less saturated fat and is higher in omega-3 fatty acids, conjugated linoleic acid and antioxidants. Today, we’re going to focus on raising cattle on 100% grass for meat, with valuable information and tips that will serve hobby farmers, homesteaders, or those aspiring to raise cattle for a living. It looks like our rule-of-thumb held up pretty good, 11 cows on 20 acres, is 1.8 acres per cow. “There are many variables in this decision, however. Let’s see how this rule-of-thumb holds up. Nick doesn’t use antibiotics on his animals… but he’s not against them either. Nick used Joel Salatin’s formula to figure out his magic number for his 50-acre property. Nowadays everyone seems to know someone close to them or in their immediate family who has cancer. He’s only had to feed them hay once when it got really cold and snowy. As livestock producers we often focus on productivity per cow. If you’re an equation type person, it looks something like this: #Cows x #Days/#acres = cow-days per acre. When I worked in construction I used to stop by McDonald’s and get a sausage biscuit on the way to work, then stop off at the convenience store and get a Mountain Dew and a can of dip. In the photos above I assumed I had 80 Cow days per acre grass on the paddock they were coming out of - you can see the grass left (not much) in the foreground on the two first pictures. In a good production year, the corn will provide a carrying capacity of 250 cow days per acre. hbspt.cta._relativeUrls=true;hbspt.cta.load(1710963, '557250b6-8739-49df-b708-db0fbc18c6b2', {}); hbspt.cta._relativeUrls=true;hbspt.cta.load(1710963, '727213d8-ed63-4c85-b5e6-8f9cc3715f8a', {}); Kristen Boye is the editor of Rethink:Rural and the owner of Holistic Writing Concepts---a copy and content writing company specializing in the natural health and green living markets. He plans to add turkeys to the rotation next year. Fruiting perennial bushes, trees and vines can be an excellent... Knowing how to cook without electricity not only makes camping and hunting trips more fun, it could make all the difference when an unexpected... No matter what you celebrate this time of year, there's nothing quite like enjoying the holidays amidst a rural backdrop. We asked the Director of Forestry and Regulatory Affairs for the FL Forestry Association about the... Fire pits are in high-demand this year as families move winter gatherings and activities outdoors. It had last been grazed for 2 days (on a much larger scale since this small section is part of a 30 acre paddock) from 6 sep to 8 sep then allowed to grow whatever until the 18th of december when i turned the cows in on it. This breaks down the cow manure quicker so the grass absorbs it as natural fertilizer, while the hens pick through it eating the parasites and the fly larvae and leave their manure.”, “Then the meat birds come along later before the grass starts to rebound and get too tall to re-fertilize, and that’s how the whole rotation works.”. This question conjures up images of thousand-acre ranches with hundreds of cows (and several good-looking cowboys) roaming through acres and acres of splotchy pastures. Even if the corn does poorly, it should provide 70 cow days per acre… Cow days per acre is a variation of ADAs, based on a manager’s particular cow size. Substantial loss of functionality, run-time errors and calculation errors will likely occur if it is run in MS Excel 2003 or earlier version of Excel. Other years, such as 2018, spring weather conditions were unfavorable for … That was my breakfast, so I wasn’t one of those people you would have thought would change so dramatically, but after seeing that documentary, I did.”. “The egg mobile design lets chicken litter fall through and fertilize the field while the hens eat the pests, dethatch the grass and take down the ant hills for you.” Says Nick. In addition to cattle, Nick also raises sheep, pigs, meat birds and laying hens. For example, corn that yielded 175 bu/acre would provide 50 grazing days for a cow. “How it works is the sheep will go through the pasture first because they’re a little pickier than the cows about the type of grass they’ll eat, then the cows come through behind the sheep and mow the rest of the grass down.”, “Then the laying hens come about five days behind the cows and scratch through the cow patties and spread them out. Besides the obvious benefits of natural pasture fertilization and feeding, Nick explains how this cycle also throws pesky parasites through a loop. When I worked in construction I used to stop by McDonald’s and get a sausage biscuit on the way to work, then stop off at the convenience store and get a Mountain Dew and a can of dip. Acres required for 200 cows for 30 days of grazing: 200 cows X 30 days = 6,000 cow grazing days required.