Tag Archives: forage

UGA Expert Warns Georgia Cattle Producers: Drought Is Threatening Herd Nutrition This Calving Season

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Tifton, GA |

Over the course of several months, much of Georgia has been gripped by drought conditions that have left pastures stressed and hay stocks stretched thin. Now, heading into the heat of summer, that pressure is landing squarely on the shoulders of cattle producers. According to experts, the concern isn’t just the drought itself — it’s the timing.

“If we don’t have rain, we won’t have grass. If we don’t have grass — the main source of feed for cows — it’s not there. So we have to look for other things to supplement or feed the cows,” said Pedro Carvalho, Beef Cattle Specialist with the University of Georgia. “We need to be watching not only the amount but also the quality. If you don’t have rain, the first thing that happens is we won’t have grass — and after that, the grass that is there is going to get worse. So we need to look for strategies and opportunities to feed hay, to feed byproducts.”

THE WORST TIME FOR A FEED SHORTAGE

For many producers, spring calving is either underway or just wrapping up — making this one of the most nutritionally demanding stretches of the year. Carvalho says the drought cut into forage quality and availability at exactly the wrong time, and if producers aren’t careful, the consequences can carry over well into next year.

“What we want is to have that cow pregnant again — to produce a calf every year. In order to do that, we have to make sure those cows have enough nutrients to not only produce milk for the calf they just had, but also maintain good body condition and enough weight to rebreed, get pregnant, and produce another calf next year,” Carvalho said.

TWO THINGS EVERY PRODUCER SHOULD DO NOW

Carvalho says every cattle producer should be doing two things right now: assessing the physical condition of their cattle, and taking stock of what feed and forage they have available — and more importantly, its quality.

“Assess the body condition of your cows during calving, because that’s one of the most important times to do that — and it’s going to determine the success of getting them pregnant again,” Carvalho said. “The other thing is to test what you have available to feed. Not just how much, but what do you have? Test your forage, test your feed, test your byproducts before you feed them to the cows.”

DON’T OVERLOOK WATER QUALITY

Beyond forage, Carvalho says producers should also be keeping a close eye on water sources. Even as some drought conditions have eased with recent rainfall, water quality remains a concern that can easily be overlooked.

“Right now, a lot of cows may have only a pond as their only source of water. Are we checking that as well — and the quality of it?” Carvalho said. “As ponds get shallow, the water is going to get dirtier and dirtier, and the quality is not the same. We need to make sure we are giving the cows enough water, and good quality water.”

For producers looking for additional guidance, Carvalho points to the UGA Beef Team’s online resources at beef.caes.uga.edu, where a range of tools and recommendations are available to help cattle producers navigate drought conditions and nutritional management through the summer months.

By: John Holcomb

State’s Forage Suffering Due to Drought, Fall Armyworms

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Tifton, GA |

Summertime is usually a productive time for forage producers here in Georgia, however, mother nature had other plans as it’s been nothing short of a headache as at first there was too much rain, then not enough mixed with scorching temperatures. According to Lisa Baxter, State Forage Extension Specialist, though things have seemed to turn around lately, the effects from this year are far from over.

“I think the last time we had spoken in the spring, we were almost dealing with the opposite of now, where we were in too wet of conditions. We’ve, pivoted since then; don’t let the green grass behind me fool you, we’ve had some periods of pretty extreme drought throughout parts of Georgia. So the worst graphic that I saw, certainly 60 to 70% of our state was in some level of a D1 to D2 drought. The problem really was when that drought hit, because that was June to early July for a lot of us. We’re not feeling those effects as much now as what I anticipate we will six months from now, when everyone’s starting to feed hay, and there just isn’t going to be as much hay to feed,” says Lisa Baxter, State Forage Extension Specialist.

To make matters worse, the dry weather ended up giving fall armyworms a chance to become established, to which now, they have been found in more than seventy percent of the state’s counties.

“Sitting here today at the time of recording, we are actually at 70% of Georgia counties reporting damage from the fall armyworm. We have isolated reports every summer, but every 5 to 6 years, we hit this point of very widespread damage. We do tend to see these more widespread outbreaks in periods of drought, and we certainly had all of those kind of cards fall into place for us this summer. It’s very disheartening for a lot of producers, but the better you take care of your grass, the more they prefer that material,” says Baxter.

Baxter says what makes fall armyworms so challenging compared to other pests is how destructive they can truly be.

“The challenge with the fall armyworm, compared to a lot of other pests that we have, is they are entirely destructive, not just a portion of the plant. So, if you’re lucky, you just see a little bit of chewing on the leaf. Pretty typical what we’d see out in a in a hay field normally, but in these big widespread instances of damage, that’s where we start getting into total field loss if we’re not careful and being proactive with our insecticides,” says Baxter.

According to Baxter, the most important thing that can be done right now is being proactive and thinking ahead, as she believes resources may be hard to come by later in the year.

“So, if we’re sitting here today with a lot of uncertainty, we need to start thinking about culling sooner rather than later. Buying hay certainly sooner rather than later. Getting it tested, making sure we’re supplementing properly and again, making those decisions now, not in December or January when we’re really going to start feeling all of these confounding effects,” says Baxter.

Baxter recommends contacting your local extension office if you need assistance with managing fall armyworms or any other forage pest.

By: John Holcomb

Hay Stocks/State Forages Struggling

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Tifton, GA

Spring has officially sprung here in Georgia which means hay fields and pastures across the state will be starting to flourish – signaling a new production year for forage producers. It’s no doubt a sight they’re excited to see after battling record high inflation and mother nature this past year that took a toll on their fields.

“Before that unseasonable cold that we had, we were already kind of ten steps behind in terms of forage production in the state,” says Lisa Baxter, State Forage Extension Specialist with UGA. “When you think about fertilizer prices, chemical prices, any input that we have was up. And so, producers cut a lot of those inputs, which slowed down our forage production. You add to that every weather challenge we seemed to have last summer. We went from too hot to too cold, too wet, too dry. We never settled in an optimum and so it was really unfortunate then when we hit last fall, a lot of producers were slow getting their winter annuals in the ground because we physically could not get the drills to go in the ground because it was so dry.”

However, according to Baxter, the difficulties last season brought is just the tip of the iceberg, as she says the state has had back-to-back difficult seasons that have caused many issues for forage producers in the state, which in turn, has even resulted in a hay shortage, as hay stocks have decreased by more than thirty percent.

“I would say our hay shortage overall started back in 2021,” says Baxter. “It was above average rainfall that year. And yes, the grass needs the moisture to grow, but we hit the point where we’re getting too much moisture and cause a lot of disease issues that we can’t control feasibly in grasses, but then we also can’t get things harvested in a timely manner. So, not only are we getting fewer harvests across the year, we’re getting lower quality harvests as well. So, you kind of catapult that into our winter forage season where fertilizer prices were starting to increase, people aren’t fertilizing their winter annuals as much. We’re relying more and more on those hay stores. Problem is, then we’ve used up anything that we had in reserve. It’s gone. We used to say, ‘ah, you just had those thirty bales in the back of the farm for that rainy day.’ We had that rainy day. It’s done.”

As producers head into this year’s production season, Baxter believes the best way forward is for producers to prioritize the fields they’d like to focus on, as input costs are still high which once again will mean thinner profit margins.

“As we start moving forward into our next production season, we need to take a good, almost survey of what forage resources we have and start making a priority list. The reality is prices aren’t going to come down immediately, and so we need to protect the most acreage we can. If we know that we’ve had low forage production across the entire farm, now’s the time to pick and choose which of these fields needs the most priority. Which ones can we kind of bring back? Which ones do we need to push to the side and say, ‘when the situation improves and weather is more in our favor, we’ll renovate these later.’ So, that’s the big thing right now is that if nothing’s really regrowing, it’s the time to plan and just reflect on what our forage production been and what can feasibly be done going forward,” says Baxter.

Baxter encourages producers to reach out to their county agents if they have questions or need assistance.

By: John Holcomb