 Good afternoon. Welcome to today's NDSU Extension Agriculture Challenges webinar. Today, we are going to be talking about swath grazing on harvested annual forages. Over the last week, we've been getting quite a few calls from producers that had some annual forages planted and with the lizard, a lot of that got crushed into a state that isn't harvestable. So swath grazing may be a potential option for managing those annual forages. Before we get started, I do have a couple housekeeping items. If you are not speaking, please mute your line. We're going to be holding all questions until the end. You can either ask your question in the chat box or you can ask your question live. You can type your question in the chat box ahead of time if you'd like and we'll make sure that gets addressed at the end. With that, I'm going to turn it over to our first speaker, Dr. Kevin Sedevic, the rangeland management specialist here in Fargo to talk about swath grazing. Good afternoon. It's nice to be here today and I've had a chance to last week to travel much of North Dakota and it's surprising how much of our annual forages are still out there. Either standing or the snow has laid them down a bit and so we've seen permanent sorghum sedan and even seen some millets. There's obviously a lot of cereal grains still standing that could be swathed as well. I want to cover swath grazing options for these annual forages and some of the risks behind it and what to look for when you're putting these up. The ones that I've seen the most are the sorghum sedan and millets. Of course, there's a lot of corn still out there and corn is still an option you could use for swathing if you know you're going to graze it. We did some work on this last year at the Fargo Rastlands Research Extension Center and it worked very well in terms of harvesting that feed with limited strip grazing. So when you look at the question usually comes down to should I swath graze it or should I stand it? And the standing grazing is still an option because it tends to be your least cost when it comes to grazing these crops. The problem with standing grazing, especially this time of the year, it's got a pretty mature as you risk a higher level of waste. When I say waste, I'm talking primarily of trampling from those animals. It tends to be less palatable. So you see more trampling of the feed for the forages and you see more defecation on those. So when you look at swath grazing, you can put these in a swath. It does add more cost to the swathing process, but it will provide a higher quality feed longer into that season. What you're missing about once you swath that crop is that whatever the quality is when you cut it will probably maintain that quality for at least four to six weeks after you cut it. And you do see less waste. And you can see this picture here. Oftentimes cattle will come up on no graze on the side of that of that swath and so you do see less defecation on there. So you tend to be more efficient in using that forage in a swath versus standing. So waste is with swath in these crops this time of year, as you can imagine. One is forage quality. A lot of these crops are mature. They've been frozen, so whatever state they're in, they're going to be at that quality level. A crude protein at this time will probably run six to eight percent, which really varies upon the crops. Your mills tend to be lower. Energy content tends to be low as well. Forty eight to fifty-two percent on the average. We've seen this on these crops. One of the biggest issues is palatability because it's cured out, it's been frozen. They tend to be stemmier and so intake and palatability tends to be lower because it doesn't taste as good. So these issues are something that you have to deal with. When you are harvesting these crops, especially with a swath-er, these leaves will shatter. So you want to minimize handling of these crops. So when you do a swath-er, which is great because you can just do a one-time swath. Leave it in that swath to minimize handling, but you'll see some leaves shatter. And of course lastly is weather. As you get into feeding these crops later in the season, weather becomes a risk. And that's going to be true whether you graze it standing or you graze it in a swath. Just know to be prepared for those potential issues that may occur with weather in the environment. So when it comes to swath grazing, it is also important to manage these to get the most out of that feed base. So look at building temporary infrastructure. Usually a hot wire will do to limit feed them. And of course always provide adequate fresh water for these animals. These are a couple of pictures that we have at such a grassland station. Different watering sources that we use for late season grazing for these cattle. So look at some fencing infrastructure to limit feed them and of course water. So we look at recommendations with swath grazing on these annual forages. This seems kind of odd, but it's important to look at wind at the time you swath them. And those swaths do blow in the wind. So we tend to like to swath them and we're not going to have a lot of wind. They do settle in about three to five days. As you can see in this picture here, the windy day following swathing, they can move across the field. I've seen many fields where actually that swaths end up in the fence line. And so just be cautionary about when you're going to put those in a swath. We highly recommend strip grazing these with temporary electric fence. It will reduce waste. It will increase harvest efficiency by 30 to 50% of those swaths. And you get a better distribution of the manure and urine across that field, which of course helps those fields in terms of fertility. Provide fresh water. One thing about when we add the water to what we'll do on these is we'll provide a back fence. So as you strip graze that water is always on the backside. So cattle or sheep always have access to water. And you move that fence away from the water source when you strip grazing them. Test these forages. We get late in the season. A lot of these feeds are going to be low in quality. So test your forage, see what your quality is, and provide supplementation if you have deficiencies. We can see deficiencies in protein. We can see deficiencies in energy, depending on what you're feeding. If you have a pregnant dried cow, we can get by with some of these lower proteins. But know what you're feeding. And more than likely these are weather feeds. And so vitamins and minerals can also be deficient on these swaths. So just know that you're looking at testing these and see what you have for quality. That's all I have for today on swath grazing these late forages. And we'll turn it over to Miranda. Thank you, Kevin. Our next speaker is going to be Carl Hoppe, the livestock system specialist at the Carrington Research Extension Center. And he's going to be talking about some of the livestock health considerations for swath grazing. Good afternoon. There we go. Good afternoon. Yes, I get to visit a little bit about swath grazing challenges this year. And we certainly do have our challenges out there. Trying to utilize whatever feeds we can to feed cows this type of year because of our wet weather we had back in October. And back in October, we had access to water, plenty of water, actually too much water. Whenever you've got considering about doing swath grazing, livestock need to have some access to liquid water. Sometimes we think about the frozen snow and using that as water. And then some herds like up in Canada or even in North Dakota, these cows may survive on some of that. Although it's always a good recommendation to have access to some type of water, liquid water available to them. I think in the previous slide series, you saw some watering facilities available down at the Central Grasslands Research Extension Center. Up in our area or other places, maybe the cows might have to walk home for water if you don't have access. But, you know, cattle will walk quite a ways in the wintertime to find feed. And since that's what they have to do for the day, they can certainly take time to find water at whatever location it can. Topping ice is certainly an option. If you need to do that, some people fire very adept at making a trough and getting water to flow into the ice. On top of the ice, let cattle drink out of and creating a trough. They keep open throughout that time of the year. But during our frozen winter, whether we're having right now access to water is probably, in my mind, the biggest issue when we come to grazing these particular crops. Another issue that you find out is some type of protection from wind. On our cold, windy days, our cattle sometimes would like to have some protection and they won't go out to graze if it's that blustery and cold. Other cows aren't quite so spoiled and they certainly will go out, whether it be windbreak fences that are permanent, or you can take portable fences out to the pasture and set those out to the field and let them set up around so the cattle don't have to migrate very far away from the grazing field. Swath graces, losses can pick up. I've read reports where they estimate between 5 and 50% of the feed could be lost, depending upon how it's done. Limit feeding is always a good idea. Looking at that, at one report identified they lost only 5% of the feed waste when they provided only enough feed for one day for the cows. If they allowed 10 days to two weeks worth of feed, the feed wastage went up to 26%. Now, just when you think swath grazing, wow, that's a lot of feed that we lost. Think of how we store our bales around our farm yard. Here's a picture of a bale that was stored over the winter, and of course with the rain hitting it, you can have quite a bit of loss in just our storage bales. So we have losses all over the place. Snow on swaths can be a nutritional concern. Usually it's not a problem. Snow usually isn't a problem. If it does crust over, we can use a tractor or something to break over the crust, maybe a tractor tire or an implement behind the tractor to kind of move the snow over so the cattle can get to the ruts. Sometimes people use mules or horses, which will trample down that, or maybe just use the aggressive cattle to go after it. After that, they open up the swaths so other cattle can come in and eat behind them or eat next to them or keep working their way down and through. There are some nutritional considerations and toxicities that you might want to consider on your swath grazing. So it's a good idea to take a nitrate test just to be safe and sure. If it comes back at zero to 1,500 parts a million nitrate nitrogen, there are other ways to measure nitrates, pass them nitrate nitrogen or just nitrate, but I always use the term nitrate nitrogen, and if it's less than 1,500 parts a million, that's safe. If it's greater than that, be concerned. Maybe you want to talk to a specialist or a nutritionist about what else they're eating and the ramifications that may happen. If it's greater than 3,000 parts a million, you need to reconsider using that as a feed source. We do have a publication that you can go to to read more about that if you want. Molds are another issue and we have a lot of rain, and we can have molds out there, but not all molds produce toxins. So if you're really concerned about toxins, you can do either a bioassay and let some animals out there and see what happens or do a lab test, which is usually a lot cheaper, and of course our veterinary diagnostic lab has opportunities to test mold for toxins and the content in them. So test if you're not sure what's going on. Feed can weather or let's call it decompose over time. Of course, if the hay was cut in June for swath grazing in October or November, there was probably a lot of decomposition going on between that time period, but most of our swath grazing is usually swathed in now or in October, and the timeframe between when the cattle graze it versus when it was cut may not be that long, especially when you have cold weather to come in effect to kind of keep that stuff from moving, decreasing its feed value. Forage maturity at swathing is another issue. Of course, most of these things are probably swathed out right now with all the annual forages that are sitting out there. Excuse me, they've been toured out with all the annual forages that are out there. We've had a lot of rain, a lot of humidity, so that's going to enhance the decomposition side of it. Temperature, frozen forages store quite well. I think we tend to forget about that right now. If we lived in Iowa, we wouldn't be thinking about our frozen winter season that we have up here, but in North Dakota, once the winter tends to set in, the ground freezes up and we stay frozen until April. So here's a picture of a thermometer stuck in a salad pile that was chopped two weeks ago. If you can read really closely, it says 32 degrees. So consequently, not much has changed in the pile since it was chopped. And a lot of our swath grazing would be the same way. Again, looking at rations, be sure to feed a balanced ration. Feed test a sample, match the forage that the cow's nutritional needs. If it's going to be low in protein, you're going to have to supply extra protein somehow. If it's low in energy, definitely extra feeds going to have to be provided, or if you've got lactating cows running with calves out at this particular time, you might have to wean the calves. So the forage, so the nutrient demands on the cows less, and that might match the cows requirements to the forages available. Of course, protein is always needed. So if we don't have at least seven, eight percent crude protein in the feed that needs to be supplied, vitamins A and E are important too. And be sure the minerals, the major minerals are needed as well as trace minerals. Remember that a lot of times our forages, annual forages, they've already cruised a lot of grain. Perhaps we need some extra calcium in the ration, depending upon what else you're eating. And trace minerals usually are somewhat devoid anyway. So with that, please consider what an overall ration you're consuming is and adjust accordingly. And thank you. Thank you, Carl. Well, now we'll open up to any questions. There isn't any in the chat box. A couple of thank reminders. Well, people are thinking of questions is that tomorrow we have a webinar series focused on connecting with resources for real stress and health. And then Thursday we'll be talking about weaning calves. If you missed this or missed any of our webinars, you can view those on our website, which is the NDSU extension website here. And if you go to the livestock management tab, down to the bottom that under the topics is tab for the webinar series. You can find all the recordings for the webinars that we've held to date. They can also be found under the egg disasters tab on the main page or the disasters tab on the main page. Do we have any questions? Seeing none. Thank everybody for joining us and we hope that you're able to join us tomorrow and Thursday. Thank you.