Khardi J Mukuyu
Yet ensuring sufficient hay supplies is critical because of the potential for long winters with deep snow.
Banister has learned to meet the twofold challenge by drought-proofing hay ground. “Growing enough hay to get my cattle through the winter year in, year out was the weak link in my operation for a long time,” he says.
More than two decades ago, he began managing hay ground in a way that borrows from his trademark grazing system, Boom-Bust Grazing. After severely grazing a pasture, he lets it rest for 23 months. Rested pastures produce robust growth in the second year after grazing, and the result is a consistent supply of grass despite drought.
Similar results occur in hay ground. He cuts the hay in a field one year and then lets it rest the next year. The result is a stable supply of hay, even during the drought years.
“In 2012, for instance, there was a severe drought, and some hayfields in this area didn’t grow much grass at all,” he says. “In fact, some ranchers’ fields produced only 10% of a normal hay crop, while my hayfields produced a normal amount.”
Banister’s hay supplies come, in part, from 400 acres of intermediate wheatgrass and 250 acres of crested wheatgrass. During the harvesting year, the 325 acres of fields that are cut typically yield more than 1 ton of hay per acre, regardless of weather.
Predictable Yield
Alternating a year of rest with a year of harvest typically produces a predictable hay yield for a couple of reasons.
When a hayfield is rested, says Banister, the tall grass it grows in the rested year covers it over winter. The grass traps snow as well as any fall or spring rain that occurs. The grass shades the ground in summer, slowing the rate at which needed moisture is lost due to evaporation.
The lowering of the temperature and the raising of the humidity at ground level beneath the canopy also control grasshoppers.
A benefit of Banister’s boom-bust haying practice is that some reseeding goes on each summer in the tame grass fields that are rested. As a result, he has not had to reseed fields, despite the fact the intermediate wheatgrass, which is normally a short-lived variety, was planted in 1956. Sweet clover, too, volunteers in rested fields.
Winter-Feeding Area
Additional hay stocks come from Banister’s 40-acre winter-feeding area. “This area produces about 150 tons of hay each summer, which amounts to a third of the hay I feed every year,” he says.
“Besides harvesting hay from this area, I’ll graze it from April to mid-May,” he adds. “With all the manure and urine left from winter feeding, I want to keep pulling the nutrients out of the ground so that the excess nitrogen doesn’t concentrate in the soil and kill the grass.”
While good-quality hay is harvested from the feeding area, the hayfields typically produce low-quality hay containing only about 5% protein. The loss in quality occurs because the hayfields that are cut each year contain dead grass that grew the year before, during the year of rest.
To adjust his overall system to reduced quality in hay, he selects for cows with the physical ability to thrive on low-quality forages. Such cattle also function well by grazing late into the winter. As a result, Banister’s hay-feeding season lasts only 90 days, running from January 1 to April 1.
Nutritional Needs
Over the years, Banister has found that high-producing cows will not rebreed under this system. Young cows, too, tend to require a higher level of protein in the winter ration in order to produce healthy calves and sufficient milk at calving.
To meet the nutritional needs of the younger cattle, Banister starts supplementing the herd about one month before calving. He feeds 3 pounds per head per day of ground peas and corn until the calves are born.
Because the genetic adaptation of his cows to the ranch’s forage quality is key to sustainable production, Banister says using destocking as a means of adjusting to drought conditions would be harmful to his operation over the long term.
Destocking would require the eventual purchase of replacement females with unproven biological adaptability to Banister’s low-quality forages.
Sweet Clover Helps Out
Despite seasons of drought, Ray Banister’s system of harvesting hayfields every other year has, in recent years, yielded sufficient hay for wintering his herd. During the years this harvesting system was evolving and proving itself, Banister relied on sweet clover, a biennial legume, to shore up hay supplies.
He included it in the crop rotation on his 2,000 acres of farmland. He would grow about 100 acres of sweet clover each year, underseeding it to wheat in spring.
After the wheat was harvested, the clover would grow until late fall’s freezing weather. The clover would regrow the following year, and Banister would cut it for hay at the full-bloom stage. It yielded 1 to 2 tons of hay per acre.
“The beauty of sweet clover is that it adds very little extra cost to the cow herd,” says Banister. “The only expenses that I charge against the cattle are the cost for the seed and the depreciation of the grass seeder attachment on the John Deere 9400 drill that I use for seeding the clover.”
Banister seeds the clover at a rate of 5 pounds per acre. Sweet clover is susceptible to insect damage in its seedling year and sometimes fails to get established. In years when this happens, he has planted field peas the following spring to harvest for hay.
Potential Danger
A possible danger when feeding sweet clover is the chance for cattle to suffer from dicoumarol poisoning. This happens if cattle eat too much sweet clover that is moldy.
As a safeguard, Banister tries to harvest swaths of clover only when the hay is absolutely dry.
To break up the
concentration of clover in the cows’ winter ration, he feeds clover for one week, then switches to feeding grass hay for a week.
He stops feeding clover three weeks before the start of calving season. Calving cows are particularly vulnerable to the effects of dicoumarol poisoning, which prevents clotting of blood.
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