Regenerative Grazing

Our local monthly paper has been featuring a series of articles on regenerative agriculture. I was asked to write one of the articles. It appears below the fold. It features one of the farms we frequent. As a bonus I've added an interview with Thomas Massey about his cattle operation and pending legislation. We're on the road today, so I'll see you later in the week.

Using Animals to Improve Soil Fertility and Restore Natural Ecosystems

Windy Hill farm manager, Brent Halderman, describes regenerative grazing as: mobbing, mowing, and moving. The team at Windy Hill in Mentone pasture raise and finish South Poll cattle and Katahdin hair sheep. Additionally, they pasture raise hens for egg production, and also grow garden produce and fruits. They involve Camp DeSoto campers to help and learn about the farm. They provide a local market every Friday afternoon for most of the year.

The idea behind regenerative grazing is to imitate the wild herds of grazing species that crowded together for predator protection. When Ted Turner reintroduced bison to his large farm, they brought the prairie back to life in desert like lands. Bison and grasslands have an age old mutual relationship. Allen Savory has done something similar in the African savanna using cattle as a substitute for wild herds. Land becoming desert is now lush with tropical grasses and elephants, lions, and other wild species. Dried water courses run once again on the Turner Ranch and the Savory project in Zimbabwe

Savory regenerative farm on the left. Neighboring continuously grazed farm on the right

It seems counter intuitive that increasing animal density, mobbing, would improve the natural system, but it is the herd impact that is the driving force. Today, movable electric fencing is the tool used to keep cattle herded together. Polywire, polyethylene cord woven with metal strands, can be put on reels that make it easy to roll out fencing that can be electrified. Step in poles provide the support. Once the animals have been trained to hot wire, typically a single strand will keep them retained. The talent lies in knowing how big or small to create the herd paddocks of daily pasture and how often to move them to new pasture. This changes from season to season as forage species and production change. In the summer, when there’s excess forage, some can be stockpiled (saved) for winter grazing. That’s why regenerative grazing is often referred to as adaptive grazing. It is a balance between animal density and how quickly they are moved.

When the reel is hung on a hot fence it electrifies the polywire.

Mowing or Grazing
Their are different strategies to utilize forage depending on the farmer’s goal. Typically, the cattle graze a third, trample a third, and leave a third for regrowth. Keeping animals from grazing all the way to the ground minimizes parasites and sickness, and maximizes forage regrowth. Some might see the trampled forage as a waste, but it is key for soil fertility. It becomes earthworm and soil microbe food. Mobbing the herd concentrates the manure and urine load, also improving fertility. However, grazing management depends on the goal. The day I visited, the some of the steers were being finished, soon to go to the processor. They were given a large paddock and allowed to eat the nutrition rich growing tips before their daily move. This left a good deal of forage stockpiled to graze this winter. Some producers use a total graze with longer rest periods thinking that management scheme promotes more plant diversity. It is as much an art as science to manage the herds, the forage, and balance animal and pasture performance.

Brent moving cattle to a new paddock

Moving animals daily (or more often) gets them off their own manure and on to fresh forage. It will be two to three months before they come back to the same area. Once animals become accustomed to moving, they are eager to access fresh forage in the next paddock and don’t require prodding or driving them to move. They see the new pasture as fresh candy bars and can’t wait to start grazing.

The challenge comes in fencing new paddocks every day and making sure water is provided in each paddock. A free choice mineral feeder moves with the animals from paddock to paddock.

Brent shows the free choice mineral feeder pulled by his ATV

The beauty of the free choice mineral feeder is animals can select the minerals they need. Additionally, the cattle and sheep help re-mineralize the soil’s missing nutrients in their manure and urine over time.

Selecting the right breed is critical for animal performance on pasture especially when finishing on pasture. Smaller framed animals tend to do better. South Poll cattle were developed by Teddy Gentry on Lookout Mountain. He crossed four breeds and selected for the cattle that were heat tolerant, long lived, docile, good mothers, and grass adapted. South Poll cattle are now common across the country on regenerative farms.

Katahdin hair sheep don’t produce wool. They shed hair. As a result their meat isn’t loaded with lanolin, and therefore tastes better. Sheep graze differently than cattle, and require guardian dogs to protect them from predators. Sheep like to browse woody and broadleaf plants, but also eat grass.

Sheep and cattle don’t share parasites, so they can be grazed one after another, or together as a flerd (flock and herd) depending on the goals for pasture management and meat production. Add in chickens and you’ve got a multi-species grazing rotation. Some producers use chickens in the grazing moves to control flies in the manure load.

Windy Hill allows campers to raise their chicks during the summer, something the kids enjoy plus it helps out on the farm. Each year they select different laying breeds in order to keep track of the age of the birds. This summer’s chicks (Rhode Island Reds) are now just old enough to start laying.

This wooded chicken pasture (silvopasture) was once a privet (Ligustrum species) thicket. They brought in a forestry mulcher and ground the privet into wood chips. In the winter they used one of the most powerful regenerative tools...bale grazing. Not in a bale ring, but rolled out across the pasture. Cows line up along the unrolled hay eating most of it, but also trampling some into the soil...all as they deposit urine and manure in the area. Here again many might object saying that practice is a waste of hay, but in reality it accomplishes many things, from planting the seed from the hay to fertilizing the soil. It also demonstrates the advantage of multi species farms like Windy Hill.

In a recent study of several farms across the Southeast (including a couple of farms on Lookout Mountain). Conventionally (continuously) grazed farms were compared with farms using the regenerative principles of mobbing, mowing, and moving. A team of scientists made many measurements. The findings are remarkable. The regenerative farms absorbed four times more carbon dioxide. They recorded 442 birds of 9 species compared to the conventional farms with 152 birds of 6 species. The regenerative farms had 33% more insect diversity and 25% more soil microbes. Regenerative farms could absorb 3.5 inches of rain/hour, but the conventional farms could only absorb 1.5 inches/hour. That’s 2.3 time more absorption, 54,000 gallons difference. After seeing the data, 80% of the conventional farms converted to regenerative practices.

We are what we eat. The same is true for the animals. Having a diverse pasture with grasses, legumes, and broadleaf plants allows animals to chose what they need. As a result their meat and eggs are more nutrient dense and healthier for us.

Animal agriculture is often criticized as being ecologically harmful. While confined feeding operations can be destructive, regenerative grazing can restore ecosystems while improving soil fertility. As Brent says, “It’s not the cow, it’s the how.”

Resources:
Seeing is believing. You can visit many regenerative operations on YouTube.

Soil Carbon Cowboys is a series of short documentaries taking you around the country to visit several regenerative operations.

Allan Williams Boston Ted talk First, heal the soil covers the SE comparative study

Allan Savory’s Ted talk How to green the world's deserts and reverse climate change, or Running out of Time, his Documentary on Holistic (or regenerative) Management describe his restoration of tropical savannas.

Greg Judy Regenerative Rancher channel post videos everyday sharing his knowledge.

Farm Like A Lunatic with Joel Salatin is also an excellent channel. He is an innovative farmer that shares his production practices.

Bonus:
Where’s the Beef: In Argentina or America? Rep. Thomas Massie

(57 min) Matt Kibbe sits down for a marathon conversation with ‪@RepThomasMassie‬(R-Ky.) to discuss President Trump’s plans to import Argentinian beef, both as a way to lower prices for American consumers and to help out Argentinian President Javier Milei. This is a little puzzling given Trump’s historic hostility toward foreign trade and his campaign promise to put America first. As someone who personally raises cattle, Massie is uniquely positioned in Congress to present the perspective of the American farmer. There is certainly no shortage of beef in our own country, but lowering prices requires relaxing a suite of crony regulations designed to protect Big Agriculture from the competition of local and independent farmers.

How the PRIME Act Could Change Food Freedom in America | Joel Salatin

(5 min) In this Q&A video, Joel Salatin discusses Kentucky Congressman Thomas Massie's PRIME Act and how it could revolutionize the food system in America. Not only would the act allow for food growers to open up their locally produced meats to a direct sale market that the USDA has locked out, it would make their products more affordable and available at a lower entry point. The PRIME Act would allow customers to have access to healthier food while developing relationships with their local farmers.

I'll close with a few farming songs...

The great Ry Cooder

Alison Krauss & Union Station - Pastures Of Plenty

Track taken from Alison Krauss & Union Station’s Grammy award winning album Lonely Runs Both Ways (2004) which won Best Country Performance By a Duo or Group with Vocal for the song "Restless", Best Country Instrumental Performance for "Unionhouse Branch", and Best Country Album.

Dirty Overalls (My Dirty Overhauls) · Woody Guthrie and Cisco Houston

Well, the guns of war have roared
And the bombs and shells have fallen
The war clouds they rumbled as they rolled.
I was a soldier in the fight
And we fought till we won;
My uniform's my dirty overalls.

This piece of land that I stand on
Is my battlefield and home;
My plow and my hoe is my gun.
Clothes don't make no difference at all
We are workers and fighters all;
My uniform's my dirty overalls.

Well, I'll give you my sweat
I'll give you my blood
And I'll give you your bread and your wine.
Before I'd be any man's slave,
I would rot down in my grave.
And you can lay me down in my dirty overalls.

Well, we settled here to stay
and I'll stick here all my days;
I'll keep marchin' in my dirty overalls.

I cut the story of the Las Damas ranch, but let me share it with you as a parting shot.
The Las Damas Ranch is located in the middle of the Chihuahuan Desert, about 250 miles due south of El Paso, TX.

They used the trick of bale grazing to bring the desert back into grassland. Once the grassland was established the cattle maintain it through rotational grazing.
The ability to triple cow numbers on the same acres with the same rainfall is testament to the ability of nature to heal herself. In addition, the fact that Alejandro did not use any chemical or mechanical means to accomplish what he did, nor did he plant any seed, is further evidence that the simple use of regenerative principles and practices are more efficacious and far more productive in restoring a degraded landscape.

Y'all will need to cover the news for yourselves today. Hope you don't mind. I spent the week writing this article, and prepping for our trip. More on that next week.
The big news haunting me is the likely attack on Venezuela. Welcome to the new Vietnam. Round and round we go, my friends.
Please help me edit this article. Any suggestions would be appreciated. The thread is open...do your best to weave a web.