Grasses and Grazing

The National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) funded a research project conducted in Kentucky, Minnesota and New York to evaluate high-quality alfalfa and alfalfa-grass mixtures.

In the not-so-good-old days, there was a time when cotton was king and grass was despised in the South. It was a hardscrabble life, and the cotton plant was easily choked by competition.

Choosing which grass to plant can be confusing. There are multiple different species, and then varieties within the species. Mix or straight, add legume or not? This can be a complicated decision.

Imagine a hay feeding system where you did not have to use a tractor all winter and, at the same time, it allowed you to build up pasture nutrient levels without applying commercial fertilizer. Would you be interested?

The cost of hay and feed for winter supplementation is one of the largest expenses for cattle producers. Stockpiling bermudagrass or bahiagrass fields for grazing use in the winter can help save on hay cost and labor. You can expect to get 30 to 60 days of grazing from this practice, but to do this you need to follow a few management steps.

High-producing dairy cows need high-quality forage to produce milk efficiently on a high-forage diet. High-quality forage is better defined by high neutral detergent fiber digestibility (NDFd) than any other single attribute.