Dennis Buermann's cows start in on white top minutes after arriving at their new pasture. Photo by Lesley Richman
My trip to Harney County, Oregon June 9 – 19, 2010 was my first opportunity to teach cows how to eat whitetop. Cows belonging to the Roaring Springs Ranch, the Borelli Ranch and to Dennis Buermann, and Carol and Alfred Dunten all learned to eat the weed. Some trainees got two days of training but even those that got only one day started eating it in pasture right away. (more…)
Dennis Buermann's cows eating White top during training
The Cooperative Weed Management Association in Harney County, Oregon invited me to work with some local ranchers to teach their cows to eat four of their nastiest weeds. I sent instructions ahead so that the ranchers could begin training by introducing their animals to a series of new foods. I arrived for the first day of introducing weeds and worked with seven ranchers from June 10 – June 19, 2010.
This was an excellent opportunity to try some weeds that I’d never trained cows to eat before. I’ll be sharing more about what I learned in the next couple of days.
Looking to the north along the west edge of our herbicide exclosure. The treated area is on the right.
Comparing an herbicide treatment to grazing treatments wasn’t part of this project originally. But when Boulder County decided to spray 99 acres of the 540 acre Mayhoffer pasture, Rob Alexander suggested we take advantage of the opportunity. We built an electric fence exclosure around the treated area. Currently our plan is to exclude grazing from the treated area for the life of this project (more…)
About 20 staff members from Boulder County, the City of Boulder, the NRCS and RCDs participated in the May 19 Rangeland Health Assessment Training. Thanks to Rob Alexander and Meaghan Huffman for setting it up and taking care of all the logistics. Also thanks to our Instructors, Josh Saunders and Herman Garcia of the NRCS. They did the training on short notice and spent two days on-site putting together training materials and taking us through the process. Babe and Leo Hogan also spent most of the day with us, sharing their 50 years of experience on the range.
The first step in our Boulder County “Creating Perfect Pastures” project is to figure out where we are right now. We decided to begin with a Rangeland Health Assessment training session, so that everyone with an interest in the project will be on the same page when discussing our project pasture’s condition, and where we want to go. (more…)
My trainees thought THIS was a perfect pasture!
In 2009, I learned there is a big difference between what trained, weed-eating cows and people think of as perfect pasture. That year, my trainees gave up on grass almost completely, and focused on the enormous variety of weeds in pasture. To learn more about what they ate, click here.
But just because the cows don’t care about grass, doesn’t mean that weeds are what we want to grow. Boulder County Parks and Open Space is managing for biodiversity, and to provide forage and habitat for wildlife, as well as recreational opportunities for residents, and weeds just won’t do. So for the next three years, we’re going to use our cows’s willingness to eat weeds combined with some different management practices, to provide everyone, including the cows and ranchers, with what they want.
