Q: What’s your management process for stockpiling grass?
A: One of the things we’ve definitely seen in the last 15 years is that it seems like our springs are colder and our falls are warmer. This is a bittersweet thing because, along with that, our falls are drier and our springs are wetter. The problem with this is that for grass to grow, it’s gotta be warm and wet. If it’s cold and wet, like in our springs, the grass won’t grow; and if it’s warm and dry, like in our falls, the grass won’t grow.
These are things we have to think about, and they’re one of the reasons we’ve invested in the last 10 years in some quite significant K-line irrigation and in building more ponds. This way, in the fall, when it’s warm but dry, we can put six inches of water on 60 or 70 acres and suddenly grow a hundred cow-days of grass. We can build some resilience. There’s nothing we can do about the temperature in the spring — but we can affect the moisture in the fall.
So, if we’re going to have these nice, warm, late falls, let’s put some attention on irrigation to leverage that — to build up a nice stockpile in those hot, dry days of September.
From Joel Salatin on the Acres U.S.A. podcast. Joel will be speaking at the 2024 Acres U.S.A. Eco-Ag Conference in Madison, Wisconsin, 2-5 December — there’s still a few days to sign up and attend! Conference.eco-ag.com
