Train Of Thought

Why do our plants behave like they do? 

Grazing management that mimics nature is more profitable, more sustainable and resilient.

Our Australian plants have evolved over large scale of time with herds of giant wombat like creatures such as Diprotoden optatum (3000kg marsupial standing 1.8 metres tall) which lived on a plant based diet, migrated with the seasons across Australia, north to south, from 1.6 million years ago and up to 10,000 years ago. These mega fauna community relationships consisting  of predators and prey, shaped/modified our flora species, ecosystem community of grasslands and grassy woodlands. More recent times >60,000 years aboriginal fire stick farming continued the shaping/modification of our grasslands and grassy woodlands. In this video shared by Science Magazine explains Rhino-sized marsupials herds roamed up to 200 kilometers over the course of a year. Part of the Diprotoden's herd Australian migration journey took it on a 200 - km round trip through the headwaters of the Condamine River Southern Queensland.

(Learn more: http://scim.ag/2wRCGOh) For 

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Historical Herbivory Effects on Grasslands. 

Grasslands co-evolved with herbivores since the late Mesozoic Era as complex, dynamic ecosystems comprised of grasses, soil biota, grazers, and predators (Retallack, 2013). Spatial and temporal variation in the grazing landscapes caused large concentrated herds of grazing ungulates to move regularly to satisfy water and nutrient requirements and to avoid recently grazed and fouled areas, and in response to their social organisation and the influences of fire, predation, hunting and herding (Bailey and Provenza, 2008; Provenza, 2008). Such periodic concentrated herbivory led to relatively short periods of heavy and uniform use of grass species as animals moved across the landscape. These periods of intense herbivory were generally followed by periods of herbivore absence during which defoliated plants regrew before the grazers returned to the area. Early hunter gatherers increasingly affected the landscape by deliberately burning areas to open them up, to drive wild animals toward hunting parties, and to attract wild grazers to recently burned areas (Pyne, 2001).This resulted in grazed ecosystems that are complex and highly resilient and sustain considerably higher levels of herbivory and animal biomass than other terrestrial habitats (Stuart Hill and Mentis, 1982; Frank et al., 1998). The interaction of fluctuating climatic conditions, fire and grazing created the resilient and dynamic networks of organisms capable of responding to episodic biophysical events, and ecosystems that never reach a steady-state or climax seral stage but rather such periodic disturbances rejuvenated and transformed grasslands, including soil structure and nutrients, plant species composition, structure and biodiversity (Rice and Parenti, 1978; Pickett and White, 1985; Hulbert, 1988).In the evolution of grassland and savanna ecosystems, synergistic interactions between soil fungi and microbes, plants, and various associated animal life forms resulted in the biosequestering of atmospheric carbon into stable soil carbon pools; these enhanced the productivity, resilience, hydrology and carbon capture capacity of these soils and the balance between carbon accumulation and oxidation rates (Frank and Groffman, 1998; Altieri, 1999; Van der Heijden et al., 2008; De Vries et al., 2012; Morriën et al., 2017). These high carbon soils have high water holding capacity, which can extend the longevity and area of green photosynthesizing leaves, and elevated evapotranspiration of water vapour and substantial latent heat fluxes that govern 95% of the earth's heat dynamics and hydrological cooling of earth and its climate (Veizer et al., 2000; Ferguson and Veizer, 2007; Pokorný et al., 2010). While these integrated biophysical systems (soils, hydrology, plants and animals) resulted in carbon sequestration rates that exceeded oxidation rates, human agricultural activities including repeated burning and tilling, hot season burning and overgrazing have led to the reversal of the soil carbon dynamic and the depletion of accumulated soil carbon.

See full paper by Dr Richard Teague and Urs Kreuter

Managing Grazing to Restore Soil Health, Ecosystem Function, and Ecosystem Services 2020 Link:

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fsufs.2020.534187/full

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Woody Weeds: Stop Partial Rest. 

Regenerative Grazing Management is the most cost effective, profitable, sustainable and resilient means of controlling weeds, rather than relying on ongoing expensive life killing herbicides or repetitive mechanical broad scale clearing. 

Regenerative Grazing focuses management on achieving 100% ground cover consisting of a large component of perennial grasses and decomposing litter. 

On a positive note weeds (plants out of place) are the Guardians of our Soil. Weeds serve a purpose to quickly cover up bare ground to prevent our valuable soil washing into to our streams when we make management errors.

There is always some plant species wanting to fill a void when there has been overgrazing, over resting and/or reduced ground cover.  The species that then proliferate are a function of the environment (such as woody weeds - galvanised burr, roley poley plants, blackberry, lantana, prickly pear, acacia, trees over thickening and annual weeds - such as thistles, nettles to name a few) and what is causing the bare ground. Things or management that we are doing. If we change or remove the causal agent, we will likely see a change in the plants that exist in the landscape.  This can be especially true in certain environments if we are moving from a situation where there has been overgrazing to one of using rest and plant recovery.  It is how we manage the grazing and rest and encourage the right conditions for the desirable species that is of great importance.  Naturally, however, things don’t always go to plan, and if we do have a perennial weed in our pastures, what might we consider with regard to managing it. 

In this video Stop Partial Rest, Allan Savory from Savory Institute explains the importance of herd impact in shaping and maintaining the landscape.

Definition of Partial Rest: This takes place when grazing animals are on the land but widespread with little bunching behaviour and herd effect. Even when plant overgrazing is stopped with Holistic Planned Grazing, partial rest remains a problem in brittle environments due to, to  large a fenced paddocks, where it can cause land regeneration to stagnate if not detected and acted upon. In less brittle environments partial rest may result in a build up of moss communities and a successional advance to woody plants.      

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In this video Allan Savory from Savory Institute discusses

 Herd Impact & Over Rest and symptom of woody woods.

    Herd Effect. Creating Herd 

What:  Apply very high animal impact, or herd effect, by inducing a behaviour change in large numbers of concentrated animals, to speed land rest.

Why: Partial rest and patch grazing greatly reduces land health and productivity. 

   The behaviour change that creates herd effect can be induced by running your herd at ultra-high stock densities with tactics such as using an attractant, such as a few bales of old hay, or coarse salt (to animals denied salt blocks), that causes animals to bunch closely and mill around for a short time on a chosen site combining with herding dogs with No Stress Stockmanship, or permanent or adaptable portable electric fencing.  

    Herd Management     

Single vs. Multiple Herds.

What: Run all your animals in one herd if possible.

Why: To increase stock density, the graze/trample-to-recovery ratio, the evenness of the grazing, the ability of animals to select their diets, speed of moves onto fresh grazing and more without a change in your stocking rate. 

 Single Herd Management 

All these things lead to higher animal, and, more importantly, land performance and profit. 

If animals need to be pulled from this herd, i.e. bulls, consider set stocking them, not using the same paddock each year so that the bulk of your animals can keep moving over more ground though more paddocks.  

Herd Management. Multiple Herd Management 

What: When multiple herds are really necessary, do your best to minimise the loss of production from the land and animals. 

Why: Because multiple herds carry a high hidden cost in lost animal and land performance. 

 Evaluate each herd you plan to run in terms of animal performance and land performance to determine the best herd number strategy for you.

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In this video Allan discusses Reducing Woody Species.

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In this video Allan discusses Over Grazing.

    Overgrazing causes decreasing Landscape Function thus causes bare ground. Weeds Overgrazing is linked to the time animals are present, rather than how many animals there are. Overgrazing commonly occurs at three different times: 

• When plants are exposed to the animals for too many days and the animals are around to re-graze the plants as they try to regrow;
   
• When animals move away but return too soon and graze the plants again while the plants are still using stored energy to reform leaf; or,
   
• Immediately following dormancy when plants are growing new leaf from stored energy. 

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We explain it in this short introductory video. How Holistic Planned Grazing Works in 60 Second

from Savory Institute

How does holistic planned grazing heal the soil? 

 About Savory Institute: Loss of grasslands leads to climate change, floods, droughts, famine, and worldwide poverty. It’s our mission to promote large-scale restoration of the world’s grasslands through Holistic Management.  Holistic Management is a process of decision-making and planning that gives people the insights and management tools needed to understand nature: resulting in better, more informed decisions that balance key social, environmental, and financial considerations.

What Is Holistic Planned Grazing? 

Holistic Planned Grazing is a planning process for dealing simply with the great complexity livestock managers face daily in integrating livestock production with crop, wildlife and forest production while working to ensure continued land regeneration, animal health and welfare, and profitability. 

Holistic Planned Grazing helps ensure that livestock are in the right place, at the right time, and with the right behaviour. 

See link for more info:

https://savory.global/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/about-holistic-planned-grazing.pdf

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