Assessing pasture health

“Assessing the health of your grazing resources is important both from an environmental and economic perspective,” Luchinski told farmnewsNOW. “Knowing your pasture’s score allows you to adjust your stocking rate and stocking density to ensure long-term productivity and profitability from those acres.”

Regular monitoring and record-keeping will give farmers the tools you need to adapt management practices to what they see on the ground.

Luchinski said by understanding what plants are there and how to manage them, producers can optimize stocking rates to get the most production they can off those acres without damaging the pasture.

“From an environmental perspective, maintaining the health of areas with perennial cover is integral for ecosystem functions such as water and nutrient cycling as well as serving as important habitat for wildlife,” she said.

Luchinski said in order to ensure the stand’s longevity and productivity there needs to be an understanding what that value means in terms of pasture management.

“Range health assessments look at what species are present versus what should be, the amount of litter present and whether there are invasive weeds. These indicators will result in a range health score and a rating of healthy, healthy with problems, or unhealthy,” she said.

Stocking rates that have been adjusted using range health scores give more of an accurate estimate of how much forage is available on those acres, which helps to balance forage supply with animal demand.

Luchinski said there is funding available for fencing to manage grazing on rangeland and in riparian areas. Information is available through the Farm Stewardship Program.

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alice.mcfarlane@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @AliceMcF

by Alice McFarlane

Assessing pasture health

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