Innovative Fence Idea for Cell Grazing

Anyone who has ever ran more than two bulls is familiar with how much fence a couple of bulls can tear out. While at the Ganaderia Valle Colombia ranch in Mexico last week, Octavio Bermudez showed me how they keep the bulls from tearing up the fences at the cell centers. It is a slick method that could be used in other areas.

Beyond Stockmanship At Rancho Las Damas

The problem I was asked to solve is one of the reasons many cattlemen do not want to try holistic, planned grazing. During calving season the cows would leave their calves behind on the daily pasture changes, resulting in a loss of 15 to 20% of the calves. As it turned out, this was a simple problem to solve. This short (2:36 ) video shows how dramatically you can change cattle behavior in a short five days.

 One of the benefits of instilling herd instinct in your cattle is that it allows you to create herd impact in areas cattle ignore without going to the time and expense of putting up and tearing down additional fence. The cattle in the picture below were placed there the night before, and spent the night because they wanted to, not because they were fenced in.

While what was accomplished with the cattle is impressive, even more impressive is the amount of forage they have created in only eight years, with nearly half of that being under drought conditions. Before beginning their grazing program, the ranch looked like their neighbor's did in the picture below.

This is what most people assume the desert should look like. Because this is what we have seen land in desert regions look for most, if not all of our lives, we wrongly assume this is what this land is supposed to look like. When talking to old timers, and people whose families have ranched here for generations, we discover that the Chihuahua desert was an immense grasslands up until the last hundred years. Then we started building fences, adding windmills and letting cattle "take care" of themselves.

With a change in grazing patterns, it does not take long for the desert to turn into lush grasslands like the picture below. Alejandro Carrillo was explaining how this grass he is standing in looked exactly like the picture above less than eight years ago. His grazing techniques were the only tools used. No plows or seeds planted other than what the cattle have done.

Looking straight down into the grass, you can't see the ground.

However when you trample the grass down and part it you can see how much seed is getting to the ground.

Occasionally Alejandro feeds cattle, or spreads straw to create litter. The picture below is of a spot where he fed a few bales earlier this year. You read that correctly, this was bare ground only a few months before this picture was taken.

The above results were obtained without the use of any mechanical equipment or seed. The only fertilizer used was that provided by the cattle. While looking at this I was thinking of the number of ranches that will feed calves in a set of pens all winter. Wouldn't it make more sense to put a set of foamed, flat proof tires on your pickup and feed them in a different spot every day? Doing that would allow you to put the gains on your calves while basically getting paid to create more grass!

One other thing which has been happening is the reduction of brush and mesquite without using herbicides. As the grasses get thicker, they are literally choking out the woody plants and killing them as in the picture below. Why would you want to control brush by spending money and time on burning expensive fuel to pull equipment or spraying chemicals which are bad for the environment when you can do it all by simply changing your grazing methods?

The amazing thing about all of this is that the seed is already in the ground. All it needs is enough animal impact and a little rain. Alejandro has been consistently adding grass to Las Damas, even through the drought of the last several years. The diversity of grasses is incredible, including the sprangletop he is pointing out in the picture below.

 If you are ranching in an arid, brittle environment, you could be transforming your ranch into one similar to the Rancho Las Damas.  For more information on how to accomplish this, visit Holistic Management International and the Savory Institute. Contact me if you would like to hold a stockmanship school on your ranch.

Forage Improvement Results From Holistic Herding

Back in October of 2012 I began a project of  using low stress stockmanship to herd 460 cows through a 32000 acre grazing plan. During the course of this grazing season, I did a few experiments to see how much ( if any) increase in forage I could get in areas where cattle normally don't graze. One area was four miles from the water source for the 280 head I placed for one day. I placed approximately 180 head to graze up a draw to the top of a long ridge, and let them keep going back on their own. There was another area which was sub-soiled with the Yeoman Plow just before it was grazed.

All of these areas (and more) improved, some with dramatic results. You can see it for yourself in this video!

Releasing The Flerd

I have been asked why this particular combination  of animals, and why combine them at all. The reason behind these species is that they just happen to be on this ranch. There are also getting to be more ranches which deal in exotic species rather than cattle or other livestock normally raised on ranches. While the numbers are not high enough to get a lot of animal impact (especially when the pastures are 1,000 acres or larger.) The intent of this experiment is to show that flerds consisting of exotic animals (or a mix of exotic and "normal" livestock) can be herded through a holistic grazing plan. The animal impact will be a bit different as they will spread out more with each species in their own group, but will still have control on which pastures they will graze and when they will graze them.

This week the burros were trapped in a pen and added to the flerd. I put the burros in a pen by themselves and just sat there for a bit, Then I positioned myself so the burros would go past me. The first few times they went pretty fast. By the fourth or fifth time they figured out they weren't being chased and slowed down to a walk. I worked them around me a few times and when they got to the point I could stop them easily, I turned them out with the rest of the flerd.

By Friday everything in the pens was getting along fairly well. On Friday I turned the flerd out into a small trap of several hundred acres. I held the burros back and let them out of the pen last, rode past them to the longhorns in the lead, and turned them back to have everything grazing across the west side of the trap. Once I got them headed the way I wanted I went back and bumped the burros a little farther from the gate, stopped them and rode off. I had a bad video week (capped off by closing the lens cover  as I was letting them out) so I don't have any video this week. On Sunday I will be moving them around the trap, and turning them into an adjacent pasture on Monday. It will be interesting to see how far apart the various species stay from each other, and how putting them together and moving them as a group will work (or if I'll have to move each species as a separate group.) Hopefully I'll have some decent video next week, but in the meantime, enjoy these pictures.

 The above picture shows just how much the burros have settled down. When they were first turned in they refused to allow a lama or alpaca to get close to them.

This is definitely a mismatch, but this alpaca doesn't seem to notice the size difference.

     Here is the flerd after I turned them out. The burros had stopped just outside the gate and I moved them about fifty yards then stopped them. It will be interesting to see how well everything moves together when I turn them out in the pasture this week. Hopefully I'll get some usable video!

Flerding Experiment

The Circle Ranch has asked me to develop a multi species herd (called a flerd) out of some of the animals on the ranch.The plan is to create a flerd by combining horses, longhorn cattle, lamas, alpacas and BLM burros. 

The burros have not been handled, so the hardest part will be getting them into the pens. Last Tuesday I managed to get them from the Middle Pasture into a trap next to headquarters. To accomplish this I opened the gate I wanted them to go through and rode to the back of the pasture. As soon as I spotted the burros I stopped and stood there until they started moving away from me, then dropped out of site.  There was a stud horse and two geldings at the gate when the burros reached it. When the stud made a short charge at the burros, I was far enough out that I loped in the same direction as the burros and managed to stop them. After nearly an hour of applying and releasing pressure a single step at a time, the burros left and the horses followed them through the gate. I continued acclimating them to seeing a person horseback for a couple of hours. When I decided they had enough for the day, I released them to walk down a fence. Unfortunately, when they reached the county road (and a cattle guard) the stud horse made another run at them, chasing them across the cattle guard, and following them into the next trap. I waited until things calmed down and removed the stud horse and his compadres to another pasture where they will be out of the way.

In the meantime, the rest of the flerd is beginning to shape up. There are peculiar challenges with this project, mainly with the alpacas and lamas. The males of these two species fight for dominance on a daily basis, which makes it difficult to combine groups of these species with each other, let alone other species. Interestingly enough, it seems that the neutered alpacas and lamas will still fight for dominance. To get around this I have removed the most aggressive males. They still fight, but the fights are a lot shorter.

In order to keep the stress levels as low as possible, I work these animals around a pen, or through several pens. Then I place the animals on feed in a separate pen. I cannot stress stress enough on how much stress is created by calling animals to feed. When we create the "Pavlov's Dog" response in animals the more aggressive animals are always on feed first leaving those lower in the pecking order to fight over what is left. Cattle which are grazing as a herd and acting as a herd will begin eating then scattering out after being fed because of the stress. However, by placing stock on feed this extra stress is removed. As you will see in the video below, the varied species in this flerd are beginning to eat with each other in only six days. This is largely because they are being placed on feed rather than going through the stress of the horses driving the cattle off feed and the cattle driving off the lamas and alpacas.

Low Stress Roping

When most people think of roping, they think of it as it is done in the arena. Run hard, throw a loop and jerk the animal around so another person can rope the heels and stretch an animal out as fast as they can. Cowboys often feel that this is the only, or at least the fastest way to get cattle doctored in the pasture. Just like low stress stockmanship, the original Vaquero style of roping appears to be slow, but is actually faster and more efficient in the long run.

A good example was one ranch I was on where we were having a scours/ pneumonia wreck.  Between two of us, we were doctoring up to 160 calves a day, or 80 to 90 calves apiece everyday. By using the old style big loop style that people consider to be "fancy," I was able to accomplish it without having to change horses at noon everyday. My cattle stayed calm and easy to handle. At the same time the other guy (who constantly cussed me for "packing a clothesline") not only had to change horses everyday at noon, but the cattle he was doctoring on would take off at a trot as soon as he rode into view.

There are several secrets to why big loop roping are low stress.

1. Variety of available loops. Rather than being limited to either a conventional run them down head or heel loop, a person will have four or five varieties of head and heel loops to fit different scenarios.
2. This variety of loops, combined with low stress handling methods allows a person to do the vast majority of their roping at a walk or trot. 
3. Allows ropers to handle cattle without constantly choking them because of the style of hondos used.

As you can see in the picture to the right, this style of hondo will give an animal a chance to breath when the rope is slackened.  While allowing an animal to have slack on the end of the rope may sound strange, in actuality is allows the animal to remain calm. This helps in two ways. If a person is doctoring cattle too large to wrestle to the ground, it allows you to trot a couple of circles around the animal (having them step over the rope with their front feet), basically heeling them so you can pull them over with minimal effort. If two people are doctoring, this allows the heeler to throw their loop and get the animal down for treatment with minimal stress on the cow and minimal effort on their horse. Combined, this method allows you to doctor more cattle on fewer horses while keeping your cattle from getting wild. 

Many people are reluctant to try the big loop style of roping because they are afraid of getting tangled up in the "extra" rope. The best way to learn is to practice on a roping dummy, then rope cattle using a breakaway hondo. If you do something wrong, instead of being tied to a cow, the hondo will release the rope. Once you get to the point of being able to stop your cattle with the breakaway hondo like in the video below, you are ready to start roping for real. Between the variety of loops and distance they can be thrown, you will be able to doctor more cattle in a day, with less effort than you ever thought possible.

  

Cowman Dressage

While "Cowboy Dressage" has turned into an arena event with no cattle, there is a reason behind doing dressage movements when working cattle. Holistic educator and low stress cattle handling clinician Guy Glosson has a saying, "You never get a second chance at a first approach."

While it is easy to make a mistake when approaching a cow to sort it off from the others, the real problem is not in the mistake, but in how we recover from it. In order to make a quick recovery, in a way that keeps the cattle calm. Having a horse that knows a little "Cowman Dressage" can go a long way in adjusting those first approach mistakes.

Handling cattle and riding a horse are two things which consist of a large amount of "intuitive feel." In order to be really good at either one, the more feel you have the better you will be. This feel is something most of us have to work at. We don't realize just how sensitive the the feel between us and the horses we ride can be. For those of us who are working cattle horseback, we often feel we don't have the time to work on it, but the fact is we pass up opportunities to work on our feel and focus nearly every time we get on a horse.

Day one of my clinics focus on developing feel and how to take advantage of our natural surroundings to build dressage movements in our horses. While we are doing this, we are also discussing cattle behavior and when to use different movements. Day two is applying these movements on cattle. These clinics are held in the pasture and limited to eight riders.
For more information on clinic dates, or to host a clinic, visit my main website.