At some point, every pasture or hayfield needs to be renovated. Although there are many useful approaches to improving a piece of land for forage production, some cover crops offer distinct advantages and disadvantages.

Livestock enterprises can use crop acres seeded to cover crops and crop residue to stretch the grazing season and save on feed costs. Crop operations benefit from the nutrient value added through livestock manure and to help with pest management.

Lots of farmers and ranchers are planting the new hybrid varieties of forage brassicas and other plants in the cabbage family. With their high levels of protein and energy, these forage brassicas show fast emergence and rapid regrowth, and they can give consistently high yields with multiple grazings, even in the face of water stress and cold stress.

In seven years, organic matter content in Matthews’ fields has gained a point and a half, and the curve is getting steeper now. “So it’s not taking us decades to make that organic matter change,” he says. “It can happen faster than people think. I mean, we’re farming in a desert, after all … but we’ve changed the soil. And you can change the soil, even in a desert.”

Winter cereals provide green, actively growing plants during the fall and early winter periods and are the first to green up in the spring.

The emerging trend toward alternative forages means it may be time to adjust crop nutrition protocols. Alfalfa has long been considered the “queen” of forages thanks to its high protein solubility and digestibility balanced with amino acids.

In the summer of 2021, the first diverse warm-season cover crop Kevin Pierce drilled into what had been a conventionally cropped monoculture of cereal rye on Noble Research Institute’s Red River Ranch was a big success.

“Everyone knows what these practices are. Many farmers are doing them already,” says Dr. Sanford Eigenbrode, professor of entomology at the UI and a project lead for the Innovative Agriculture and Marketing Partnership (IAMP).

While we carefully select species to plant in our fields and utilize as cover crops or plan a total mixed ration, many ranchers do not know the primary grass species being consumed by their livestock.