Grass growth averaged 58kg/day again this week around the country.
The high sunshine levels over the last couple of days is helping to hold the growth. The weather has have led to ideal grazing conditions. Now is a good opportunity to focus on grazing out covers well and maximising grass utilisation.
Average farm cover (AFC) is now over 1,000kg/ha on a lot of farms. The focus up to now has been on building grass and taking advantage of the last period where growth exceeds demand. It was important to do this to extend the grazing season and ensure grass will be available next spring.
However now it’s important to manage the AFC and not to exceed 1,100kg/ha on lowly stocked farms. Farmers with a stocking rate of less than 2.5 cows/ha are going to continue to build covers into October. A peak AFC of a 1000kg is plenty for these lower stocked farmers and will make it a lot easier to manage quality and hit target closing cover of 550kg on 1 December.
A lot of these lower stocking rate farms are on heavy soils and could have all stock housed in early November.
A peak AFC of 1,000kg should be plenty to keep a high proportion of grass in the diet of the cows until housing and still hit the target closing cover.
These farms will be finished grazing before 1 December but the target stays the same – just allow for grass growth after closing. So you might be closing the farm at an AFC of 400kg and hit the target of 550kg on 1 December. Also on these farms it’s important to graze the heaviest land when the chance arises. Not letting the covers on the wettest fields exceed 1,000kg Dm/ha from October on will give you more chances to graze them later. This will help you avoid high covers on wet land in the spring.
Average growth for the week was 58kg/dayA peak average farm cover of 1000kg/ha for lowly stocked farms and heavy soil Keeping pre-grazing yield low on the wettest paddocks from now will give you a better chance to graze them later.
Grass growth averaged 58kg/day again this week around the country.
The high sunshine levels over the last couple of days is helping to hold the growth. The weather has have led to ideal grazing conditions. Now is a good opportunity to focus on grazing out covers well and maximising grass utilisation.
Average farm cover (AFC) is now over 1,000kg/ha on a lot of farms. The focus up to now has been on building grass and taking advantage of the last period where growth exceeds demand. It was important to do this to extend the grazing season and ensure grass will be available next spring.
However now it’s important to manage the AFC and not to exceed 1,100kg/ha on lowly stocked farms. Farmers with a stocking rate of less than 2.5 cows/ha are going to continue to build covers into October. A peak AFC of a 1000kg is plenty for these lower stocked farmers and will make it a lot easier to manage quality and hit target closing cover of 550kg on 1 December.
A lot of these lower stocking rate farms are on heavy soils and could have all stock housed in early November.
A peak AFC of 1,000kg should be plenty to keep a high proportion of grass in the diet of the cows until housing and still hit the target closing cover.
These farms will be finished grazing before 1 December but the target stays the same – just allow for grass growth after closing. So you might be closing the farm at an AFC of 400kg and hit the target of 550kg on 1 December. Also on these farms it’s important to graze the heaviest land when the chance arises. Not letting the covers on the wettest fields exceed 1,000kg Dm/ha from October on will give you more chances to graze them later. This will help you avoid high covers on wet land in the spring.
Average growth for the week was 58kg/dayA peak average farm cover of 1000kg/ha for lowly stocked farms and heavy soil Keeping pre-grazing yield low on the wettest paddocks from now will give you a better chance to graze them later. 
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