The current pasture I am working on is
closed canopy land, nothing much was growing on the soil between the hickory
trees and cedar trees.
I first went through the area with surveyor tape and marked the spindly trees, damaged trees and then selected others so the area would have enough open to sun space for grasses to grow well.
I also limbed up the cedars to be able to get to the trunks to cut them down, the cut branches were used to form a "hedge" on the other side of my property line and also for creating berms to slow and move water so it will soak into the soil instead of running straight down the mountain and eroding all the soil away.
Next up is cutting down the cedars since they provide far to much shade in the silvo pasture I am building, these will become either
fence posts or deck posts since the cedar is a sacred tree to my people, it must be put to a purpose.
I have already spread 2 50lb. bags of annual rye grass over this area, this was to get a root system going and to have a crop to cut down once I've done the over seeding, that will help with reducing bird pressure on my new native grass seeds.
Once those sprout and have grown for two weeks I'll do another over seeding and this one will have not only the native grasses but some rape, seven top turnip, yellow clover, Dutch white clover, crimson clover and a few other plant items mixed in.
From that point I just have to wait for the growth to get about a month old so I can do a cutting, this cut will force the grasses to put out more
roots and it will multiply the top growth for better density and the extra roots prevent the animals from ripping out the whole plant and creating bare spots.
I have a mulching mower I use for this cutting, that way all the cut grasses and other plants settle to the soil surface and
feed the pasture as it grows stronger.
The mulching mower chops the plants into small enough pieces for this to happen without laying over or smothering any of my pasture grasses and plants.
After about a year this pasture will appear to be almost all native grasses since they grow the tallest and will end up shading out some of the other plants.
This pasture is also going to have a "border" set in of things like plantain and comfrey, it will be about 3 feet wide and that will be for taking cuttings to the
compost heaps, twice a year.
Growing plants in soil automatically starts the soil building process. If you make some
mushroom slurries and spread those around the pasture, it will introduce fungi to the soil and that will increase the bacteria counts over time.
Making and spraying compost teas is another great way to introduce extra life to the soil so the improvements come along faster.
Once the pasture is established I try to let the animals do more of the work for me, such as trampling, grazing and
poop and
pee are the natural way to improve the established pasture.
I put the right number of animals on the space so this all happens over a week, then I move them to another pasture paddock. My goal is to let a pasture rest for at least 8 weeks between grazing periods for good recovery of the plant materials.
This does take a little math and observation to get just right.
Redhawk
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