Looking for advice re grazing cattle

[newbury]

And then for the OP's purpose there are also "hair sheep", no wool to worry about, mainly for brush control.

 

[jyoutz]

Are you sure? I just looked them up

from the wicki
Maybe they were 400kg give or take.
/edit
Belted Galloway - Wikipedia

No way that a miniature breed weighs that much. A full sized breed like angus will weigh in at about 1200 lbs. for a market ready steer.

 

[ponytug]

Thanks Peter, I think that is what we will do. I did love having the mules here for a time - one issue was that they would not tolerate any dog they did not know. The guy that brought them had three heelers and that was no problem but we had to watchout for our dogs.

A while back I looked into a BLM(?) wild burro adoption program. There was a 'distribution' center in California as I recall. I think you had to take two, and convince them you had appropriate facilities and would take care of them properly. I may look at that again or find a mule. The mules that were here were - I think - retired park pack animals. Very affectionate - which surprised me.

We lived for a bit in a town that had a couple of burros in our local park. They were definitely fan favorites. I find them endearing.

I would definitely add a voice for raising low line cattle. We have raised low line belted galloways for about fifteen years now. Our goal is fire control first and a small stream of steers and heifers for sale, either on the hoof or for beef. Our bull was about 1200' and 42" at the shoulder; his dad was 1800', and 43", both pretty massive, but incredibly gentle. The cows and steers run closer to 36" at the shoulder and 6-800lbs, though we have one cow that is closer to 40" and 1,000lbs. We have found them to be gentle, easy to handle, and a pleasure to be around and work with. They are out in all weathers, and seem to thrive on even tough pastures. My wife is pretty petite, and had no trouble handling our bull. We have never been stepped on or pushed. We do have a sweep for running the cattle through for annual vaccinations.

We did consider Dexters, but in the end I am very glad we ended up with the belted galloways, as they have no horns.

Yes, while Japanese Waygu may be more tender, I think that belted galloways produce the best beef. "Mini" belted galloways can be quite small, 200-300lbs, and I am not sure that I would go that small.

Here is the herd, along with a fifteen hand Arabian "watch" horse.

All the best,

Peter

 

[Eagle1]

Dexter's are also on our radar. My wife has had a Dexter steak years ago and remembers it as being the best steak she's ever eaten. Something about being double muscled, I think. How is their temperament? Any danger working with them?

For the most part Dexter (like Belties) are very easy to work with. You will the the occasional cranky one but that means some head shaking, I can grab my bulls horn and move him out of the way when needed, just don't be between him and sweet feed, he won't stop just amble right to his bowl. All of ours have horns and I prefer that. They know their range and tap with their horn rather than slam their whole head at you like polled cattle tend to do. The come when called and rarely test the fencing. We started as complete newbies and nobody has been injured yet, well my wife likes to trip in the mud. If you are ever in MO I'll give you tour, or ask any Dexter (or Beltie) owners most are happy to show their animals.
As for mini sizes they are not much bigger than a dog (well my kind of dogs) something like 32 to 38 at the shoulder, standard dexters are still under ~4 foot for the most part. I can move most steers with my BX to get them to the house for processing, not lift but drag onto a trailer and pull them up using a pulley for processing. My bull and the current crossbred steer are more than BX would like, but the LS will do just fine.

 

[newbury]

You all are starting to want me to raise Dexter's and herd them with Corgi's! (my kind of dog )
/edit - how many acres of pasture would be needed for 3 Dexter's in north Mississippi?

 

[Eagle1]

Acres are hard to answer, really depends and will change as they eat their way trough. Best I can do is with 5 cows,bull and 3 steers a 4x5 bale of hay lasts right at a week in the winter. We do supplement a scoop of sweet feed per animal once a day, to keep them friendly. Might have to up a bit if it really gets cold below 10F or negative.
Right now there is no pasture (too dry) but they eating the acorns/persimmons and about half of normal hay usage.
I have to ration hay or my bull will make a nest to lay in by shredding a bale after moving the hay feeder out of the way.

 

[ericm979]

Grazing the grass down to the roots is great for fire but it's not so good for erosion or for maintaining the best species of grass. The least palatable species often survive the best when the land is grazed hard. So next years' forage is lower quality.

You might consider doing what ranchers did where I grew up (and still do now)- make firebreaks by discing or blading every year. Then you can decouple the grazing from the fire risk reduction.

Also if you already have a good cleared area around your buildings and the rest of the property is mostly grassland, having that burn is not all that bad. Grassland often comes back better after it's burned.

 

[ponytug]

@newbury to add to @Eagle1's description, if you actively move the cattle from an area that they can graze in 2-3 days, to new pasture, giving the land a month to eight weeks to recover, you will be able to stock higher levels than if you just turn the cattle loose in one big pasture. So, it depends, on rainfall, soil fertility, and management practices.

Here, it is about one cow calf pair for 10 acres, while across the valley to the east, it is closer to one per 15-20 acres, and the other side of our ridge going west, it is one cow calf pair per 5-7 acres.

All the best,

Peter

 

[LouNY]

And around here we can do a bit better then a cow/calve per tillable acre, but there is a considerable amount of forage that has to be put up for the winter and even some summer feeding. Tillage is a better utilization of ground here but it does drive cost up also. When our pastures are in there prime we are running 60 head on 4 to 6 acre parcels, in rotation.

 

[EddieWalker]

My fencing plan is to create 4 pastures of about a dozen acres each, with half being good quality grass, a quarter being wooded, and the other quarter being kind of a mix. Long term will be to increase the amount of grass and maybe even learn how to make round bales myself. Finding hay seems to be a challenge every other year because of rain, bugs or fertilizer. Seems it's always something!! The current plan is to rotate the animals into a fresh pasture every week, and keep them there for the week. Then I will have three weeks to work on, improve, clean up and spray the pasture they just left. Here, hay peaks in protein about every 30 days, so this should allow me to have the best grass for them, every week. This is all just my thoughts on doing this. I'm getting a 16 foot cattle trailer this weekend, so that's another step in the right direction.

I really enjoy reading everyones experience with Belted Galloways and Dexter's, or any other small breed of cattle.