Soil and Pasture Health
Status: Proven (the grazing methods) · My own build (the robot-assisted version I'm testing)
The goal
A pasture that looks good everywhere: even grass, no bare loafing spots, manure spread across the whole place. Every robot on this site exists to serve that.
Why grazing management matters
MU Extension compares three systems (MU Extension EQ379):
| System | Paddocks | What MU says |
|---|---|---|
| Continuous | 1 | Cattle use only 30 to 35% of the grass; poor manure distribution |
| Rotational | 2 to 7 | Rest and regrowth, more forage; manure may still concentrate |
| Management-intensive (MiG) | 8 or more | Up to 70% use of forage, better nutrient cycling, fewer weeds; more labor and setup |
NRCS's Prescribed Grazing standard aims to improve ground cover, infiltration, and soil health through controlled stocking, timing, and recovery (NRCS 528).
The catch with MiG has always been labor: more fence and more water moves. That's exactly the labor I want Nofence and my water robot to take over.
The rules of thumb I'm using
From MU Extension EQ379:
- Graze short, rest long. Beef herds should graze a paddock less than five days, ideally three or fewer.
- Rest periods: about 20 days in good spring growth, 40 days or more for cool-season grass in midsummer.
- Paddock count = (rest days ÷ grazing days) + 1. A 30-day rest with 3-day grazing means 11 paddocks.
- Intake: cattle eat about 3 lb of dry matter per 100 lb of body weight per day (1 animal unit = 1,000 lb = 30 lb DM/day).
- Water within 700 to 900 feet, inside the paddock.
What around 20 acres might carry (illustrative only)
MU's worked example runs 100 acres of cool-season pasture (2.5 tons/acre hay-equivalent, 710 lb dry matter per acre per 30-day rest period) and carries 57 cow-calf pairs of 1,250 lb in the growing season. If I plug my roughly 20 acres into the same method with the same assumptions, that's roughly 11 pairs and about 11 paddocks of roughly 1.8 acres each.
That's not my plan. It's an upper-bound sketch for the growing season (April to November) on average grass, and it doesn't count winter feed. My real yields are unknown until I measure, and I'll start with far fewer head for myself, friends, and family.
What I'll measure
- Forage before and after each grazing (to calibrate the formula above)
- Soil tests by paddock, starting with a baseline
- Bare ground and manure spread, especially where the water robot has been
- Satellite trends from the free Rangeland Analysis Platform (rangelands.app), which may be limited on small improved pastures
Results will go on this page.