From the Barns: In drought mode

Are we finally seeing the last days of 90s? Sure do hope so! We are seriously back in the drought mode again — although, row crops in the neighborhood are coming out at a record pace with most of the soybeans gone and a lot of corn, as well. Carson has reduced our cow numbers here instead of feeding hay. The earliest winter calvers were moved to corn residue closer to his home and, as mentioned last month, half of the stocker steers grazing the sorghum-sudangrass also were shipped out to a Nebraska feedlot.

So, with just 34 cows here trying to get by on what is left of our reed canary grass paddocks not torched by the armyworms and 122 steers on sorghum-sudangrass, we are praying our stockpiled fescue paddocks will sometime before freezing get some growing rain. It is the worst situation we have been in this time of year since I took over the management of River Oak in 1969. The years 2012 and 2013 were challenging from drought, but we were not dealing with armyworms at the same time. I have never seen reed canary grass not grow in a drought, except this situation with the armyworms left stems that have not leafed back out.

I enjoyed touring two classes of students from Western Illinois University beef nutrition studies and also networking with those who attended the Illinois Grazing Lands Coalition Grazing Schools. The schools had a good number of younger producers in attendance. I came away from both schools feeling that there is a movement beginning.

New-generation producers who cannot continue the row-crop operation they have been left with because of inability to afford machinery for smaller acres, inability to hire custom operators, inability to find large operators interested in their acres, but are interested in livestock, are converting their row-crop acres to pastures to intensely manage grazing animals.

It is a conversion that seems to make a lot of sense economically and from an equipment and management aspect. Those in attendance at our grazing schools who are in this process are approaching these changes with as much knowledge and enthusiasm as possible. It is very interesting to see.

Our partnership with Illinois Forage and Grasslands Council continues to grow producing a great resource website, https://illinoisforage.org. Take time to check it out and be sure and see some of the new videos. Really proud of our staff for all the work in building this website.

I didn’t include it in my complaints in the opening paragraph, but we did receive an inch of rain in September that germinated our rye and kale seeding that we had no-tilled into the sorghum-sudangrass after the third rotation. It will have a tough time competing, as the sorghum-sudangrass continued to grow while it laid in dry dirt for two to three weeks. It is a good stand if it can compete, especially with little moisture available.

Enjoy fall temperatures coming, leaf colors, letting the yard go, watching some championship baseball or some football and, most of all, stay safe and sane.