A friend reminded me yesterday that I never addressed the tale of the two pastures! That’s what happens when work gets in the way! So here goes: Most of us do not have perfect pastures seeded every year with correct fertilizer, amendments, manure removal, and perfect climactic conditions. There are some things we need to do to promote the health of the pasture and the animals grazing it though. The most important consideration is to not overgraze. More than one horse per two acres will lead to overgrazing damage. This damage includes packing of the soil, damage to plant roots, the allowing of weed overgrowth since horses preferentially eat grass leaving weeds, and the ingestion of parasites as the horses graze closer to the ground.
Rotating animals off a pasture will allow a grazed field to recover and improve. Resting a field for four weeks allows grass to recover from trampling. Resting eight weeks allows much of the parasite larvae to die. While the pasture is not being grazed, you can mow the weeds (they will be taller than the grass since horses don’t prefer to graze weeds). Try to mow before the seed heads develop on the weeds to prevent their spreading, and mow to a height of 3-4 inches. The mower can be used to spread manure piles or you can drag them separately. Depending on the size of your pasture you may choose to remove manure piles or spread them out. Spreading (or dragging) manure distributes nutrients to the pasture, allows air and water to penetrate soil that was covered by hard manure piles, and it uncovers parasite eggs exposing them to the killing effects of sun and air. Eggs are killed the best by hot sun and dry days. Hence our parasite problem in the humid South.
The most common equine parasite in the Southeastern U.S. is the strongyle. When the passed eggs hatch, the larvae move onto the grass, especially in wet conditions like we have now in the spring. These particular larvae stay close to the ground and are grazed if pastures have become very short. Horses on overgrazed pasture will graze closer to manure piles than they normally would, also increasing their potential to ingest strongyles. Most parasites are in the pasture and not in the horse. There are no standard deworming plans for horses. It depends on where they live and what they do. We evaluate the horses based on these items as well as a microscopic fecal exam to determine their parasite load and from there, come up with a deworming plan for that individual.
There are many ways to improve a pasture for better grazing: soil testing, turning, seeding, fertilizing, irrigating, etc., the agricultural extension agents are great sources for information, as well as people who have super pastures. In my opinion, not overgrazing is one of the best. Back to our original pictures: both of these are pastures for commercial cattle I work for in Baldwin Co. Guess which one contains big fat, shiny cows with a lot of healthy calves on the ground?
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