Webinar: Lessons learnt from outwintering cattle this winter
In the last in our Winter Webinar series we partnered with Pasture for Life to discuss outwintering cattle.
We were joined by 2023 Soil Farmer of the Year Stuart Johnson, from our mentoring team, Pasture for Life Technical Director Nikki Yoxall and Northumberland beef and sheep farmer Angus Nelless.
You can watch the full webinar below:
Stuart has experimented with a variety of different approaches to outwintering at West Wharmley Farm, which he farms with his family near Hexham.
These have included set stocking in a silage and sacrifice field and putting feeders out with the cattle, strip grazing forage crops and bale grazing on stubbles with no forage crops.
"All three of these necessitated a lot of cost and work at the end of the winter and so we've dramatically moved away from them,” says Stuart.
“My whole goal now is to make sure when we go through the winter, I don't have to go back in and spend any time or money on reseeds.”
Finding an effective approach to outwintering
Stuart has found the most successful approach on his farm is to use adaptive multi-paddock grazing on deferred grazing which has been allowed to recover since mid-summer.
He combines this with some bale grazing when conditions allow.
“My whole goal now is to make sure when we go through the winter, I don’t have to go back in and spend any time or money on reseeds.”
“I utilise bale grazing as and when the weather's on our side,” he says.
“So if it's frosty I can go and steal a day. If the weather is wet I'll just keep moving them day to day.”
The financial benefits of outwintering
Stuart says housing cattle over the winter costs £2.50 per animal per day just in variable costs
"If we can keep them outside as long as possible, we're finding that we're sub 50p a day, including all our time, including the minerals that are going out to them and including feeding bales.
“We had 190 cattle outside this year until February. So that's £380 every day that we can save.
Stuart Johnson mentoring for Regenerate Outcomes
“When we're talking about enterprises that have historically been very marginal enterprises, that's really important in going from an unprofitable enterprise into a profitable one.”
Building soil aggregates is key
“In order to build soil structure so the ground can carry the animals through the winter it is essential to give fields those long rest periods to build soil aggregation.
“On a very, very basic level, aggregates mean resilience, which means we can keep the cattle out as long as possible.
Enhanced nutrient cycling
“The AMP grazing system allows us to grow it, graze it and have the cows defecate it back down all in the same spot.
“That manure coming out of the animal is in the perfect form for the soil biology to make use of it and there's also less risk of pollution compared to using slurry.
“The AMP grazing system allows us to grow it, graze it and have the cows defecate it back down all in the same spot.”
“We're seeing that we're reducing all fertiliser usage across the farm by stimulating the nutrient cycling and we’ve also got a lower carbon footprint, because we're not transporting silage everywhere.
Healthier cattle
“The cows calve better and they have improved mobility because of the amount of exercise they are getting.
"They also have much lower stress levels and an improved temperament because they get used to you being around them all the time.
“If you get a little bit of infection in their feet in the sheds it can rip through them all, but that's very unlikely to happen when we keep them outside. So we're seeing improved feet right through our herd and less disease and interventions in general.”
You can get more advice from Stuart by watching the full webinar or reading his blog on outwintering for Pasture for Life.
Outwintering advice from Nikki Yoxall
Nikki runs Grampian Graziers with husband James in the North East of Scotland. They have been outwintering cattle for about six years at over 450m above sea level, with significant cost savings compared to housing cattle.
“The Scottish average, just for feed for a spring calving suckler herd on a 180-day winter is £280 pounds per head,” says Nikki.
“For us it's £62 per head for a 180-day winter, and that works out at somewhere around 34p a day.
“The ability to reduce cost is phenomenal. We've been going through a serious period of growth in our business and the only way we can do that is because we're not carrying debt for capital that we can't afford.
“We're able to invest all of our money that we can into livestock and use them to drive the business, rather than investing in things that cost more money to run.”
Nikki Yoxall
Nikki says it is important to have a strong stockpile of well developed forage ready for the livestock as the autumn approaches.
"What I really want is a nice, thick sward,” she says.
“I don't ever want to be able to see the soil when I look down into the ground before grazing it.
"A massive part of what we do is deferring grass, making sure that we've got a really good rotation during the growing season, so that we can optimise the majority of our in-by.
“That means that we can use these more scrubby, mosaic habitats for winter, because they offer so much shelter and they give the cows a really, really good belly full because of the diversity of grasses.”
“The ability to reduce cost is phenomenal. We’ve been going through a serious period of growth in our business and the only way we can do that is because we’re not carrying debt for capital that we can’t afford. ”
Nikki says it is important to appreciate the value and benefit of trees and other cover when outwintering and try to use this to your advantage.
“I think something I've also really learned this year is how we sometimes overestimate the dietary requirements of our livestock,” she says.
“Our animals are basically grazing standing hay. But if we use our observation skills and carry out rapid assessments each day - such as rumen fill, dung scores, behaviours in the cattle and impact on the ground - all of those things will allow us to decide whether or not they're getting what they need. All of those indicators, at the moment, are telling us they're doing OK.”
The power of bale grazing
“Bale grazing is such an incredible way of feeding hay, and it also gives them a dry lie on the snow.
“I don't mind about a bit of waste, because it's still going to be cheaper than building a shed and having a tractor.
"Almost all of our hay is species rich so we can use it to help improve the species richness of our pastures as well.”
Nikki and James encourage bale grazing in patches of bracken, which results in cattle trampling down the bracken, as well as leaving a residual mulch to discourage growth and lay down a diversity of seed.
“We've had some amazing results with that over the last few years on fairly small areas, and we're going to be testing on bigger areas going forward,” says Nikki.
Book your tickets to our Soil Health Workshops now
Stuart will be one of the team leading our Soil Health Workshops in England, Scotland and Wales, alongside regenerative farming pioneer Dr Allen Williams.
Join us for two days of practical insights into building soil health to grow profits and improve crop and livestock performance on your farm.