A Pasture Walk with Greg Judy

by Ida Livingston of Davis City, IA

This spring I had been asked to set up a booth at the Homestead Summit in Lamoni, Iowa and demonstrate basket making. So April 11th and 12th found me sitting at a booth demonstrating the art of basketry beside a table full of Small Farmer’s Journals and books.

This event brought together many local and non-local small farmers and business owners and those who support them. There were other demonstrators showcasing tallow-making, sheep shearing and wool processing, among other things. The speakers included Joel Salatin and Jamon Mysliwiec.

In a booth across from me I got to know Logan and Natalie DeGraffenried. Their daughter Juniper would come over to visit with my then 5-month-old Kaya. Logan and Natalie own and operate the Princeton Missouri meat market. They do custom meat processing and offer of grass-fed beef to their network of customers in Northern Missouri.

My husband Khoke runs a fair size herd of grass-fed beef, the herd size ranging from 80 to 100 head of cows. We live in the Midwest and making the connections with the grass-fed market in the remote rural landscape we find ourselves in, has proven daunting. Unfortunately our good grass-fed cattle are too often just sold on the open market.

In the contact exchange with Logan, we ended up supplying a grass-fed cow to meet an order he had for one. One of the ongoing conversations resulted in an invite to a Pasture Walk with Greg Judy. So mid-June found Khoke and I with his cousin, Nathan Miller, driving three and a half hours southeast to learn more about pasture management.

Pasture #1

After following a number of ever-narrowing roads we found the pretty Green Pastures Farm. Shortly after parking, we reloaded and joined a procession of vehicles to see a pasture that Greg leases. On this pasture, 122 cow/calf pairs had been moved onto a 6 acre paddock only an hour previous.

Barely into the pasture, we met a bin of minerals. Pulling back the rubber flap that was covering it, one found a bin divided into 8 to 10 sections, each supplying an individual mineral. This included calcium, phosphorus, potassium, magnesium, sulfur, iodine, selenium manganese and gray sea salt from a mine in Kansas. This allows the cattle to free-feed minerals as they crave/need them and not overeat other minerals in their attempt to absorb what they need.

Mr. Judy explained how he will rotate the cattle through his pastures as often as four times a day, moving them to new paddocks. This takes a lot of commitment and work. However, this has the cattle moving in relatively small paddocks and spreads the manure evenly, fertilizing the paddocks behind them optimally as they go.

The number of cattle and the acreage needs to be balanced so that once the cattle have worked their way through all the paddocks, the grass in the first paddock is ready to be revisited. Grazed grass has a flat edge at the end of the blade; it is ready to regraze when it has regrown to having points on all the presiding leaves.

Greg recommends only grazing the grass down 1/3; this leaves 1/3 to be trampled and essentially feed the soil, and one third remaining or encouraging wildlife. The grass blade is the plant’s solar panel, and the more panel it has the more energy it has to readily regrow.

Over-grazing too close to the ground also makes cattle vulnerable to parasites that are consumed as they come out of their life cycle in the soil. They are sheltered in the recesses of vegetation when ready to be ingested for their next phase inside a host. They need the moisture and shelter found lower on the plants to survive as they wait. Grazing only the upper sections of vegetation can leave them waiting and help break the cycle.

Cattle can move through the pastures at different rates throughout the year. Grass grows quickly in the ideal conditions spring often offers with warm weather and rain. In the summer however, it is essential to monitor rainfall. If it is dry, one may need to be careful to graze lightly as to not tax pastures in danger of drought-induced dormancy.

Rotational Grazing Benefits

There are many benefits that come from rotational grazing. Having a high concentration of animals on a small paddock eats down the vegetation evenly. It can help get rid of pasture weeds and seedling trees, and it builds your soil quickly. The herd moving over a small paddock is a manure spreader on hoof, fertilizing as they go. This helps regenerate the grass as it regrows post-grazing. Another benefit is that you can raise more livestock on less acreage: as your soil builds up it will be able to sustain more animals.

Flies

Mr. Judy is a vocal advocate of cattle who slick off well, shedding winter coats to a nice slick summer coat. A slick shiny coat is easier for the body to put out its natural oils that may help deter flies. Healthy cattle in general will deter flies. When a cow’s body starts putting out stress pheromones it can draw flies. Stress pheromones signal “eat me I might be dying,” a beacon call for flies.

A novel idea that Greg is trialing is the incorporation of tree swallows for fly control. Reportedly, a pair of tree swallows can consume as many as 8,000 flies per day. As interesting as it is, I also wonder who got the government grant to count them all.

Capitalizing on this report, Greg built over 600 tree swallow bird houses last winter. He made metal entrances so the woodwork woodpeckers couldn’t enlarge the opening and hijacked the nest boxes. These boxes were then posted at intervals all around his pastures.

I would have thought that introducing that many nest boxes in one year would have oversupplied the local tree swallow housing demand. Not by as much as what I would have thought. Greg said that he guessed from what he observed that about 75% of the boxes housed a pair of tree swallows. He thought that there was a noticeable difference in the fly pressure, particularly that of horse flies.

Pinkeye

A regular problem in herds of cattle is an infection of pinkeye. The bacteria that causes this is spread by flies and untreated, it can render the animal with seriously impaired vision if not blind altogether. Common treatments can include an injection of antibiotic in the eyelid and an eye patch to protect the sensitive eye from light. It is a tedious treatment plan, frustrating both the animal and the farmer.

Preventative plans for pinkeye include vaccinations. Optimal health by providing adequate minerals during pregnancy also greatly reduces the incidence of pinkeye. Keeping fly populations to a minimum is also a way to prevent pinkeye by slowing/stopping its vehicle of transportation.

Greg shared a new remedy for pinkeye that he had recently learned about and had begun implementing. This method involves simply squeezing some Neosporin into the infected eye of the animal. There were no details as to how often this was reapplied or if only a single application was necessary. Greg said he has had few incidents of pinkeye but he had a bull come down with it. He tested the Neosporin treatment on the bull and was successful. The bull gave no indication that the Neosporin cream in his eye was uncomfortable and I think it was successfully resolved.

Sheep

In the second pasture we visited, Greg Judy showed the flock of sheep he used to follow the cattle. Immediately after moving cattle off a lot, he follows them with sheep. Sheep love to eat the pasture weeds and encroaching shrubs and small trees. They have livestock guardian dogs in their company to help keep them safe from wildlife.

Hay or No

Greg Judy highly discourages mowing hay. This is cutting off the vegetation and grazing cycle that feeds the soil. He suggested that if you do feel the need to mow so that you have hay during the winter snowfall, feed the hay on the same ground it was harvested from. Don’t use a bale ring, unroll the bale, spreading it out so the cattle will eat it and spread their manure over the pasture.

Practical for small farms?

Rotational grazing on the scale that Greg is talking about is not practical for farms with pastures too small, five acre pasture lots are small for this. You may be able to rent or lease additional acreage to make it more doable.

Another consideration, if you were within a reasonable distance of a number of small farms that wish to work together, the animals could be combined and work their way through the pasture paddocks of multiple farms in a system set up like a cooperative. This was suggested to an Amish man who was wondering how to make it practical with his limited pasture and his lack of electric fence.

More Information

Greg and Jan Judy own and operate the Green Pastures Farm in Clark, Missouri. Greg has also written a number of books detailing the methods he implements on his farm. These outline all the details that are not expanded on in this article. He helps give the information to build up your farm from the ground up.

Green Pastures Farm
21975 Devil’s Washboard
Clark, MO 65243
gtjudy4099@gmail.com

Books:
How to Think Like a Grazier
No Risk Ranching
Comeback Farms