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Re: Seed ahy and other alternatives

Steve Winter wrote:

> Native Range (i.e. cows grazing a pasture)  50 - 64% TDN  1.7 - 7.2% DP
> Prairie Hay (late bloom)   49% TDN  2.2% DP
> Alfalfa (mid bloom) 58% TDN 12.1% DP
> Brome Pasture (i.e. cows grazing a pasture) 66% TDN  9.2% DP
> Brome Hay  54%TDN  5% DP

Does the data differentiate between burned and unburned (in same spring)
grass, and does the data of the other grasses come from fields on the 
same soil type and within a few miles of the other grasses in the
same calendar year(s)? I am also curious as to the native 
range composition and its condition, and what about the presence of
warm-season 
legumes and maturing sedges and wild rye? I have always found the 
numbers in forage texts to be suspect as they come from different
sources
but are put together on the same page.
 
>Feeding
>strictly native hay to cows in the winter (mid-gestation to calving
>period) here would not meet the nutritional requirements of the cows, and
>some negative consequences would include reduced birth weights, reduced

I know this is getting off the subject of prairies, but I wanted to
point out
that if one proposes prairies as the foundation for a grazing operation,
then
the grazing operation must fit the prairie, and not the other way
around. The 
entire grazing operation must fit into a low-input model with the right
kind of cows (or bison) and the right kind of grass management and the 
right kind of herd management( Late spring/ early summer calving).
The focus has to be on long-term profit, not production, all subject 
to the constraint of a proper, conservative stocking rate with the 
goal of increasing the quantity and quality of the grasses and 
forbs until a steady state between yearly stocking and the grass is
reached. 

> In many areas there is a predominance of cool season pastures (I'm
> familiar with parts of Nebraska and Missouri that fit this) that provide
> good grazing in the spring and some in the fall, but little in the summer.
> That is where a warm season pasture would be a real benefit - a
> complimentary pasture that is grazed during the summer. Also, it typically
> would be really inefficient to feed strictly alfalfa to a cow during the
> winter - they don't need that much protein, it exceeds their requirement.
> So if you have warm season harvested forages to balance or "cut" the
> alfalfa with, you can mix the two types of forages to meet the cows
> requirements and reduce your costs, because the warm season forage should
> be cheaper to produce if it is grown on marginal land.  Warm season forage

It really depends upon the forage. E gamagrass will green up around the 
last frost and be ready to graze three weeks later, and it can be grazed
until
the first frost, while Switchgrass will need another four weeks and
quickly 
loses quality after bloom begins. An almost pure stand of Illinois
Bundleflower
would compete with Alfalfa, I suspect. And I have yet to see pure stands
tested of
native, cool season graminoids. There are literally hundreds of PHD
projects
to be found in native plants as forages. 

-Austin Moseley
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