{"id":13058,"date":"2023-11-30T17:20:46","date_gmt":"2023-11-30T17:20:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thestar.test\/2023\/11\/30\/increase-pasture-growth-during-winter-2\/"},"modified":"2023-12-02T18:34:03","modified_gmt":"2023-12-02T18:34:03","slug":"increase-pasture-growth-during-winter-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/blog\/increase-pasture-growth-during-winter-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Increase pasture growth during winter"},"content":{"rendered":"
\t\t\t\tTuesday, August 14th, 2018<\/span> | Posted by Sarah Vella<\/a><\/span> \t\t\t<\/div>\n

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Increase pasture growth during winter<\/h1>\n

WITH autumn resulting in less than favourable conditions across a lot of the state, many farmers went into winter with less pasture in front than desired.
Agriculture Victoria livestock extension officer Fiona Baker said pasture growth rates during winter can be doubled, through good grazing and pasture management.
\u201cIn June 2016, a farm in East Gippsland compared grazed strategies of two paddocks side by side. One paddock was grazed for two days, the other grazed for six days. Both paddocks were strip-grazed, but stock was not excluded from re-grazing areas they had been the day before,\u201d she said.
\u201cA month later, when pasture growth rates were measured, the paddock grazed for two days had double the growth rate of the one that was grazed six days (18kgDM\/ha\/day). The difference in leaf size of the regrowing pastures was also vastly different between the two.\u201d
Running temporary troughs off the main trough and moving the new strip, or fencing it behind, can help to minimise the effects of back-grazing in the system and further increase growth rates.
Another alternative to improving winter feed growth is using urea.
\u201cWith fodder costs rising this winter, urea can be a very cost-effective means of growing extra feed,\u201d Ms Baker said.
\u201cAn application of nitrogen fertiliser is most efficient when applied at rates between 60-100kg urea per hectare. If growth conditions are moderate (soil temperature is above 12 degrees and plants have reasonable leaf area and moisture) response rates should be around 10:1.
\u201cIt is important that stock are kept off the paddock for 21 days post urea application, as nitrate toxicity can be a concern if grazed too early.\u201d
A third option is to use gibberellic acid, which is a naturally occurring plant hormone. Generally, the colder the day time temperatures, the better the response.
The rapid plant growth that can occur through the use of gibberellic acid leads to plants often being lighter in colour, however this doesn\u2019t affect the quality of feed on offer.
Ideally, stock should be kept off the pastures for three weeks after application, to allow maximum response.
\u201cPhalaris based pastures are highly responsive to gibberellic acid with recommended rates of application of 2.5 to 10 g of gibberellic acid\/100L water. Pastures that are dominant in perennial ryegrass, annual ryegrass or cocksfoot, require 20g\/100L water. But as each product is different, follow the recommended rates,\u201d Ms Baker said.
If soils are not moist enough to support plant growth it is recommended holding off on applying until soil moisture levels improve.<\/p>\n

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Proven techniques: farmers can make the most of slower winter pasture growth by using methods suggested by Agriculture Victoria.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPosted by Sarah Vella<\/a> \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\ton Aug 14 2018. Filed under Rural News<\/a>. \t\t\t\t\tYou can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0<\/a>. \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tYou can leave a response or trackback to this entry\t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
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Tuesday, August 14th, 2018 | Posted by Sarah Vella Increase pasture growth during winter WITH autumn resulting in less than favourable conditions across a lot of the state, many farmers went into winter with less pasture in front than desired. Agriculture Victoria livestock extension officer Fiona Baker said pasture growth rates during winter can be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13058"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13058"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13058\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15505,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13058\/revisions\/15505"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thestar.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}