Robyn Stewart
If you are following the Lincoln County UGA Extension Facebook page, you may have seen a photo skim across your timeline this week comparing a warm season pasture with a cool season planting. In Georgia, one of our biggest advantages in the livestock industries is our ability to grow and graze forage throughout most of the winter months. The ability to produce and graze winter forages drastically reduces our reliance on stored forage like hay and supplemental feed. These things combined can reduce input cost and improve producer profitability. In order to get the most out of winter grazing, there are several things to consider.
First things first, it is important to decide what species of grasses will meet your needs. In Lincoln County, we have a lot of pastures with warm season perennial grasses such as bahiagrass and bermudagrass. With proper management, these species typically provide good grazing from May to August however, warm season species will go dormant in the colder months. With the addition of a cool season grass species, we can add grazing availability in the spring and fall in addition to our summer pasture. Instead of having good forage for 4-6 months in the summer, we can boost that to around 10 months of the year. There are several cool-season species that work well in our region, but I typically recommend annual grasses over perennials. Perennials can persist for several years, but typically do not establish as well nor provide as much volume of grazing as annuals do, despite the labor involved with seeding annuals each year. The most common winter annual in Lincoln County is ryegrass, which is one of the highest quality forages that we can produce in Georgia.
In order to get the most out of your winter grazing, it is important to note a few things that contribute to the establishment of grass species. The quality of soil in your pasture is essential to getting your winter forages established. We always recommend you take soil samples before making any amendments such as lime or fertilizer. The best establishment and growth will occur when grasses have proper pH, nitrogen, and other nutrient levels. Most winter annuals will need an application of nitrogen at planting or soon after to ensure tillering (thickening of the stand) and early grazing. A second application of nitrogen should be applied in late January or early February, which can help increase winter and spring forage production. If you choose to plant legume species with your grasses, you can often decrease the amount of nitrogen you apply. Some grass species, like ryegrass, benefit from a third application of nitrogen, as it can produce late into the spring compared to other species.
A common error made when establishing cool season annuals for grazing is that farms do not allow the plants to get established before they graze them. Keeping livestock on a freshly seeded pasture often results in the stock eating the young, growing shoots of grass. Although this may not kill the plants, they will never fully recover and produce at the level they would have had they been established properly. Allowing plants to grow and develop a root system will improve their drought tolerance and production over the long term. Most cool season annuals should not be grazed until they reach 6-8” in height, and you should pull animals from grass when they have grazed it down to 2-3” in height. Rotating pastures or putting up temporary fences are great ways to keep animals off of pastures when establishing new species.
With proper management and establishment, cool season forages can reduce the stress of feeding livestock through the winter. If you have any questions on grass species, soil amendments, or getting grass species established, feel free to contact us at uge3181@uga.edu or 706-359-3233
