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Acres per cow?

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JesseCarstairs

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Is there any kind of general rule of thumb on how many acres per cow you need? Cows are being grassfed, more of an organic style living. Thank you.
 
JesseCarstairs said:
Is there any kind of general rule of thumb on how many acres per cow you need? Cows are being grassfed, more of an organic style living. Thank you.
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Totally dependent on the area where you have land. Some parts of the country you can run a pair per 3 acres, some areas it make take a section.
 
My old range specialist grew up during the depression and survived the 50s drought. Swore up and down to take your annual rainfall in inches, and run that many cows per section. No additional feeding, just feed off the range
 
cowman52 said:
My old range specialist grew up during the depression and survived the 50s drought. Swore up and down to take your annual rainfall in inches, and run that many cows per section. No additional feeding, just feed off the range
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I'll bet that is about as close as any one can come for generalization.
 
so if average rainfall is 65 inches a year, you run 65 cows per section? Next question is how many acres is a section?
 
Here if you fertilize and keep weeds mowed you can fur a cow calf pair on about 2 acres most years - - - the last couple we have needed about 4 or 5 but hopefully we will get back to normal temps and rainfall.

This is with the pastures cut up so they only have about 1/4th acre per pair in each pasture and you rotate and try to mow within two days of moving them and fertilize twice a year - - - in the spring to get growth and in the fall to have a healthy carryover of the good grasses.
 
Wouldn't the type of grasses grown have to be figured into the equation? Whether the grasses are native, or planted would make a difference. Ours is nearly all native grasses, and many varieties of that.

Here, we get 15 inches of total precipitation, with the majority of it USUALLY coming during the growing season. It seems the timing of the moisture would also have a high involvement.

Then the soil types. Ours is gumbo, for the most part. It holds water pretty well, and water penetrates quite deeply.

Terrain would matter, it seems to me. We figure about 20 to 25 acres, and sure do adjust during a drought to protect those native grass pastures.

mrj
 
Soil type and what time of year you get the moisture have to be figured in somehow. About a year ago we had about 10 inches of moisture in late oct early nov. Our soil holds the moisture very well so we were doing pretty good for the first half of this year. You go 150 miles east where my wife is from there is a lot of rock and not very good soil, they had the same rains, but most of it went in the ponds. So a lot of moisture not during the growing season down there dosn't do as much good as it does here.
 
The number of acres you run an AU on is pretty cut and dry. You take the number of acres you utilize to feed your cow herd and divide it by the number of cows you run. That equation is largely varied if you have highly productive ground, farm ground or productive meadows. My point is that even if you hay meadows, harvest pivots or graze stalks you still have to use those acres to feed your cattle. If you have a ranch that does not have any farm ground but has hay meadows, the amount of feed harvested off of that meadow should be the same whether it is grazed or hayed. Actually you should increase your production if you graze them. I would sure hate to try to make a living putting a pair per inch of rainfall on a section in this country, it would be a good way to starve to death.
 
This thread reminds me of the ole rancher up by Worden who got a new
neighbor from the western part of the state. When the guy from the west
asked the ole' rancher how many cows he could run to the acre, the old
guy put his hands out and said, "Three. Sometimes four, but mostly three." :p :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
 
Excellent point Jody.
I have seen a lot of variability in this equation, based on location, and moisture. All I know for sure is the acreage average is trending up, especially in the last decade. It also seems that calves that have seen mud run easier than those that grow up with dirt streaks down their face.
 
Haytrucker said:
Excellent point Jody.
I have seen a lot of variability in this equation, based on location, and moisture. All I know for sure is the acreage average is trending up, especially in the last decade. It also seems that calves that have seen mud run easier than those that grow up with dirt streaks down their face.
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:nod:
It sure makes a ranch easier to run when it rains.
 
Farmerkuk, I'm not sure if we figure the hay ground into that equasion, and the numbers are flexible according to the quality of pastures, drought, and winter severity.

We have mostly prairie hay, the terrain is pretty rough and any flats we have are either on creek bottoms and very small, or on higher ground and they are rough having been buffalo wallows in the past, before that era ended, AND our previous generations were very strong in believing the prairie should never have been turned over. I believe any 'farm ground' we have now (all hay ground now) was broke up in homestead days. In spite of considerable help from the first generation here, most of them could not make a living on those small homesteads, and asked our family to buy when they decided to leave.

We hay cows in winter only if there is very short pasture, like this year, or if it is covered deep in snow. We do supplement some, either with cake of an equivalent. We sure do miss the old cottonseed cake. We have sold a lot of cull cows this year due to drought.Also sold open hiefers which we would have kept to run on grass next summer if the moisture situation was better. Our cows are getting to the size we want them, but not really down there yet.

My brother does have an 18 year old cow we raised and sold at a sale barn which he bought when they were maybe 10 to 12 years old. He has done ok with them! Most, maybe all have had a calf each year, and the 18 year old is carrying a big calf now!

We do have our calves in a backgrounding lot, with various rations set for what we want them to gain, some just on a growing mix, and the bigger ones getting pushed a little to be sold in January or so. If we get moisture to start the grass good, we may run some of the calves over the summer to sell as yearlings next fall.

We try to learn from others and from our mistakes, too. Being a little flexible has served us pretty well as we transition from my generation to the next two on this ranch. Trying to make it viable for them has always been our first consideration.
 
A section is one square mile, or 640 acres. Here is was generally thought that a section of native range would support 60 cows and calves for the summer. On Indian lease land the BIA uses an animal unit per month basis it figures out to about 13 head per quarter section. I used the quarter section figure because the old Indian allotments were set up as 160 acres each.
Some of the old timers say this is to low, but it seems that year in and year out it works fairly well.

It seems to me that it would take about the same pounds of hay to winter a cow if the temperature stayed in the comfort zone, but during cold weather she would need more. remember though, she isn't nursing a calf then.

It is said that it takes about 2# of feed dry matter basis a day per hundred weight for a cow to maintain herself if you don't take temperature into consideration. This might give you an idea of how much feed a cow harvests for herself during the grazing period and if you harvest feed for her how many more acres you would need.
 
"It is said that it takes about 2# of feed dry matter basis a day per hundred weight for a cow
to maintain herself if you don't take temperature into consideration.
This might give you an idea of how much feed a cow harvests for herself during the grazing period and if you harvest feed for her how many more acres you would need."

I believe that to be correct, Clarence. If cows need to gain some weight
they need at least 2.5% of their body weight per hundred and 3% would be even better.
And when it gets really cold, you can't feed a cow enough. The best time to get them in shape for winter is before winter sets in. :p

Excuse me. I guess that wasn't really what was being discussed here. Didn't mean to
hijack the thread but it is a good thing to remember so I'll leave it.
 

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