freeze

It is getting late for our first hard freeze of the season and I guess that is a good thing for our late planted corn.  However, it makes late season grazing more difficult.  We graze our hay fields in lieu of a final machine cutting.  Because the sward is something over fifty percent alfalfa and clovers, and because those two plants get quite dangerous for bloat whenever there is a nip frost in the fall, we are reduced to cutting the grazing ahead and letting it lay and cure for most of a day before turning the cattle in.  We don't cut too far ahead of course, for fear of heavy rain on the swath making it unpalatable.  It is a nuisance to get the machinery out there every fourth or fifth  day.  But then so is hay feeding, or dead cattle, if it comes to that. 

Next month we will go back to the complex cover crop to graze the rape/turnip and ryegrass one final time.  The sorghum sudan in that planting will be standing straw by then, as it is an African crop and will not tolerate even a light frost.  We hope to be able to set the fences to take advantage of the corn stalks and thus extend the grazing season well into December.  We will evidently need more acres in a grazing practice to go much later than that.

Meanwhile, of course, we mainly work getting the place ready to winter livestock.  I look forward to the first snow covering and the peaceful restful time it implies.  That feeling will hold for a few hours until we have to get out there and push the stuff around.