This winter I did my own bale grazing experiment. I had the same experience. Ended up hand spreading the leftovers to get a thinner cover so it doesn’t choke everything out this season. Turns into more labor than simply unrolling and strip grazing or hand feeding off the bale. Good video!
Hi Jason, interesting video about the additional cost to Bale grazing. A lot of the farmers that Bale Graze probably are large enough to produce their own Hay which would be cheaper than having to buy the bales you need to feed. One solution I thought of watching this, that would allow the Sheep to have their portion, is to take about 4 Wheelbarrows out of the big bale. Once you put the large bale and the cattle are surrounding it feeding you could go in the Wheelbarrows and put 8 small piles for the Sheep to eat off of. The cattle would be so busy eating they probably wouldn't even notice. Like the idea of putting the Roosters in to the leftover hay that has Cow manure and letting them scratch through it and break everything down.
Thanks for watching, Ben! Even producing your own hay, making double still doesn’t pencil out even at scale. Double the input costs, plus extra could be sold, etc. The pecking order with the animals really is fascinating. 9 head of Devon, so they will continue to spread out until you have 10 piles!🤣
@@birchfieldfarmingyou definitely need to try a bale ring. Even a plastic one will work. I do want to try one myself but many others use them and love them.
@@mossyrootsfarm2263Unfortunately, hay rings do not work with sheep and cattle together, as the sheep would never eat. I’ve seen them firsthand with cattle only though and definitely a utilization improvement over just dropping and/or rolling out rounds. The key we’ve found is hitting that sweet spot where we put out only what they’re consuming, splitting it twice a day even better.
@@birchfieldfarming I do not know anything about sheep so that may be an issue. However my wife worked on a sheep farm growing up and they used bale rings for the sheep. But a gentleman's farm I was just at used a cattle panel to wrap his round bales for his sheep. So maybe that's an option for you as well. Cows might be able to eat through it. Or put out two bales. One with a cattle panel wrapped around it for sheep and a bale ring for cows. That may be the golden ticket for your sheep anyway. Keep the cows from bullying them. Either way you mentioned a labor issue in your video as well as a cost issue. And a ring will solve all of your issues you had at the end. Other than potential sheep issues. I understand a ring can be a big investment. But I put our 42 bales in less than 6 hours with my tractor so for the whole year I spent 6 hours and 5-10 minutes every 6 days to move rings and fence. Plus I didn't have to fork out all 42,000lbs of hay haha.
@@mossyrootsfarm2263Good thoughts here and helpful to others as well. I’m curious, what’s it look like when you move rings? As in how much would you estimate they leave behind in hay?
What kind of drone do you use to get the footage you use in your videos? We are bale grazing through this winter. It's too early to tell how they will impact the pasture this year but it's definitely been nice just going out and opening a new bale when needed rather than having to move them throughout winter and also having to go out and feed every day, especially when I'm 7 months pregnant lol
I think it’s a DJI 3 maybe, I’ll have to ask Sam…yes, I will say it was very nice for that 48 hours NOT to have to put hay out. Everybody’s context is different, and I’m glad it’s making the workload more manageable for you when expecting. Congrats on the soon to be new addition!😀
"I'm wasting hay to improve fertility" is a poor argument. Having hay go through an animal, to be turned into manure, then mixed with a cheap bedding material (like straw or wood chips), and then composted, then spread evenly on pasture, IMPROVES its ability to fertilize the land. MULTIPLIES its value as a fertilizer. So you're saving hay and MULTIPLYING the fertility value of what you're feeding. There are of course costs. You are adding complexity: equipment, space for your composting windrow, labor, planning. So I understand Greg Judy's way of doing things: pretty sure the guy doesn't even own a tractor. Is his process less efficient? Probably. Is he putting down LESS FERTILITY? Absolutely, but, in his context, that's not a problem: as per what he himself says, land is extremely cheap to rent in his area. A lot of it he's getting for free, in fact. He gains no benefit from maximizing the fertility of land he's renting for free. He just needs to improve the land enough to convince the land owner to let him have it. He can do that just fine with rotational grazing and bale grazing, he doesn't need to do any more. But I strongly disagree with Greg Judy when he's preaching his method as the "best and only way". I think someone who owns a bit of land, in an area where land is expensive, would be insane to fail to put all his effort into maximizing fertility. And you do that by collecting manure, composting it, and spreading it out on pasture. The way Salatin does it. Salatin's pigs are of course optional. You can just pile your manure in a windrow, leave it for a year, and it'll turn into compost on its own. Long story short, if you want to maximize fertility, you should actually increase stocking density: the more animals you have, the more they eat, the more manure they produce, the more fertility you're adding. If you want to double your hay input because hay is cheap and you want to bring in fertility this way, go for it: but do it by adding enough animals to eat it all, not by wasting half of it and leaving it to dry out and evaporate into the atmosphere (that's what it does, for the most part ... the earthworms take some down into the soil, but most of it goes poof into the air). You're doing brilliantly, Jason, please keep it up, and keep sharing what you're up to. The cover crop idea, to get you through the late summer, is brilliant too. Another great way to justify your ridiculously high stocking density.
This winter I did my own bale grazing experiment. I had the same experience. Ended up hand spreading the leftovers to get a thinner cover so it doesn’t choke everything out this season. Turns into more labor than simply unrolling and strip grazing or hand feeding off the bale. Good video!
Interesting, thanks for sharing!
Did you guys use a bale ring or just leave it out for the animals?
Just left it out standing on its side
This is my plan. Come spring, we will run the lawnmower through the pasture to spread everything out more.
Hi Jason, interesting video about the additional cost to Bale grazing. A lot of the farmers that Bale Graze probably are large enough to produce their own Hay which would be cheaper than having to buy the bales you need to feed.
One solution I thought of watching this, that would allow the Sheep to have their portion, is to take about 4 Wheelbarrows out of the big bale. Once you put the large bale and the cattle are surrounding it feeding you could go in the Wheelbarrows and put 8 small piles for the Sheep to eat off of. The cattle would be so busy eating they probably wouldn't even notice.
Like the idea of putting the Roosters in to the leftover hay that has Cow manure and letting them scratch through it and break everything down.
Thanks for watching, Ben! Even producing your own hay, making double still doesn’t pencil out even at scale. Double the input costs, plus extra could be sold, etc. The pecking order with the animals really is fascinating. 9 head of Devon, so they will continue to spread out until you have 10 piles!🤣
@@birchfieldfarmingyou definitely need to try a bale ring. Even a plastic one will work. I do want to try one myself but many others use them and love them.
@@mossyrootsfarm2263Unfortunately, hay rings do not work with sheep and cattle together, as the sheep would never eat. I’ve seen them firsthand with cattle only though and definitely a utilization improvement over just dropping and/or rolling out rounds. The key we’ve found is hitting that sweet spot where we put out only what they’re consuming, splitting it twice a day even better.
@@birchfieldfarming I do not know anything about sheep so that may be an issue. However my wife worked on a sheep farm growing up and they used bale rings for the sheep. But a gentleman's farm I was just at used a cattle panel to wrap his round bales for his sheep. So maybe that's an option for you as well. Cows might be able to eat through it. Or put out two bales. One with a cattle panel wrapped around it for sheep and a bale ring for cows. That may be the golden ticket for your sheep anyway. Keep the cows from bullying them.
Either way you mentioned a labor issue in your video as well as a cost issue. And a ring will solve all of your issues you had at the end. Other than potential sheep issues. I understand a ring can be a big investment. But I put our 42 bales in less than 6 hours with my tractor so for the whole year I spent 6 hours and 5-10 minutes every 6 days to move rings and fence. Plus I didn't have to fork out all 42,000lbs of hay haha.
@@mossyrootsfarm2263Good thoughts here and helpful to others as well. I’m curious, what’s it look like when you move rings? As in how much would you estimate they leave behind in hay?
Your videos brighten my mornings, thanks 🙏
Thanks Stuart!🤠
What kind of drone do you use to get the footage you use in your videos?
We are bale grazing through this winter. It's too early to tell how they will impact the pasture this year but it's definitely been nice just going out and opening a new bale when needed rather than having to move them throughout winter and also having to go out and feed every day, especially when I'm 7 months pregnant lol
I think it’s a DJI 3 maybe, I’ll have to ask Sam…yes, I will say it was very nice for that 48 hours NOT to have to put hay out. Everybody’s context is different, and I’m glad it’s making the workload more manageable for you when expecting. Congrats on the soon to be new addition!😀
@birchfieldfarming thank you :) definitely able to relate a lot more to my pregnant ewes this year 😆
@@ShepherdsCreekDJI Mini 3…Sam says, “be sure to tell her it’s NOT a “pro”🤣. Ok, bud.
@@birchfieldfarming lmao perfect! I'm far from a pro anyway 😆 😆 😆
"I'm wasting hay to improve fertility" is a poor argument. Having hay go through an animal, to be turned into manure, then mixed with a cheap bedding material (like straw or wood chips), and then composted, then spread evenly on pasture, IMPROVES its ability to fertilize the land. MULTIPLIES its value as a fertilizer. So you're saving hay and MULTIPLYING the fertility value of what you're feeding.
There are of course costs. You are adding complexity: equipment, space for your composting windrow, labor, planning. So I understand Greg Judy's way of doing things: pretty sure the guy doesn't even own a tractor. Is his process less efficient? Probably. Is he putting down LESS FERTILITY? Absolutely, but, in his context, that's not a problem: as per what he himself says, land is extremely cheap to rent in his area. A lot of it he's getting for free, in fact. He gains no benefit from maximizing the fertility of land he's renting for free. He just needs to improve the land enough to convince the land owner to let him have it. He can do that just fine with rotational grazing and bale grazing, he doesn't need to do any more.
But I strongly disagree with Greg Judy when he's preaching his method as the "best and only way". I think someone who owns a bit of land, in an area where land is expensive, would be insane to fail to put all his effort into maximizing fertility. And you do that by collecting manure, composting it, and spreading it out on pasture. The way Salatin does it. Salatin's pigs are of course optional. You can just pile your manure in a windrow, leave it for a year, and it'll turn into compost on its own.
Long story short, if you want to maximize fertility, you should actually increase stocking density: the more animals you have, the more they eat, the more manure they produce, the more fertility you're adding. If you want to double your hay input because hay is cheap and you want to bring in fertility this way, go for it: but do it by adding enough animals to eat it all, not by wasting half of it and leaving it to dry out and evaporate into the atmosphere (that's what it does, for the most part ... the earthworms take some down into the soil, but most of it goes poof into the air).
You're doing brilliantly, Jason, please keep it up, and keep sharing what you're up to. The cover crop idea, to get you through the late summer, is brilliant too. Another great way to justify your ridiculously high stocking density.
Yeah…I’m in the run it thru the animal camp. I still can’t hardly get grass to grow in this spot many months later…pigweed everywhere.