Nutrition
mower. They were selectively
grazing. They preferred more
tender, larger leaf plants
over more stemmy, mature
growth. They also tended to
graze legumes, Bromegrass,
and then Orchardgrass before
endophyte-infected Fescue.
Cattle are largely path of
least resistance eaters. They
like the stuff that is easy to
eat. The tender, immature
plants. Generally, those plants
136 | JUNE/JULY 2018
are often higher in nutritive
value than a mature plant
too. Unless we stock cattle
at a very high density, they
will typically eat the good
stuff and ignore the rest. Fescue, maybe fall grazing
should be the priority for those
areas. Few things are as good
as stockpiled Fescue in the
early winter, but cattle sure
don’t care for it in the spring.
I think this observation can
help answer a lot of questions.
If you’re seeding a new pasture,
plant a mixture of species, but
plant species that cattle like
to consume. Also, if you have
pastures that are predominately Now, I also observed several
spots that were ungrazed
adjacent to areas that were
heavily grazed. Many times, the
areas that were left ungrazed
were inhabited by a manure
patty or a spiny weed. Cattle