The nice thing here is that we have enough ground that we never hay or graze all of it. We do rent out some. However, I'm keeping a close watch and it the (dead)grass starts to disappear too soon, I'll have to move cattle and goats to another farm. Luckily none of our ponds have gone dry. Some are really low, but not dry. I have seen a lot of dried up ponds around here, so I feel fortunate. However some of our ponds are built on springs. Now I just wonder if those springs are drying up.

I'm also supplying protein.

 

As far as ponds go, all of ours our dried up. Fortunately i have a couple frost free waters on deep well.

 

25 acres of good pasture can't support 10 cows and three horses. Have had to feed hay. Hay crop reduced to about half. Cut hay on 80 acres to get enough to winter feed and some small square bales to sell.
Left three horses boarded downstate because they have hay. They upped the grain ration and cut back on the hay.
The oats don't seem affected. Will know soon.

 

Just started chopping silage now getting about 1/2 the tonnage per acre from last year . Our corn crop is horrible would be surprised if it makes 20 bu per acre . Bought in lots of straw and 2 semi loads of big square bales out fo kentucky to run through the grinder with the silage

 

I made an excellent first cutting of hay thanks to some God sent rains. It was a huge blessing because there will be NO second cutting. The pastures are all dry and crunchy, the ponds are nearly dry, and I'm going to be feeding hay by early next month.

 

We have had to buy 30 tons of large rounds at $80 a bale to make up for the ruduced yeilds on the fields we lease. I have enough hay for a normal winter now but we are going to have to pull off summer pasture very soon and normally don't have to untill October. We have 25 head prices have dropped so it's not worth selling them now so we will try to find some more hay though there is non left locally.

 

Does this look dry?

 

Does this look dry?

Hows this affecting your rotations agmantoo?

 

I am OK for now. Most of the cattle are in BCS 5 and with the hot weather they are not needing a lot of energy so they are holding condition. Actually I have had a good calf crop through the drought. My concern is for reseeding damaged areas soon and getting some growth on the dormant fescue before going into Winter. I have some crabgrass in the bottom land area but the crabgrass has to drop seed to reseed itself before I let the cattle graze it. The dry weather has hindered seed production on the crabgrass. After the next 6 to 8 weeks time period lack of moisture could become critical for me. My best chance could be that Hurricane season brings some rain up the East coast. Time will tell.

 

I got my first measurable rain in 70 days, .60 inch. Pastures are understocked but still will have to pull before OCT. Thankfully cornstocks will be available early. My dry land corn will not cut enough tonnage to justify hiring a silage crew. I will bale some. Hay here is $250-$300/ton. Culling cows. Droughts suck.

 

If we had not gotten a good price on hay, we'd be selling out. We have used the same "hay guy" for several years, so he did NOT raise his price this year to us. Even so, having to start feeding hay so early is going to add a lot of expense. If we just had commercial cattle, I think we would sell out and buy more if/when conditions improve. But we have a purebred herd of a fairly hard to find breed so we are trying to hang on to our genetics.

 

I'm almost reluctant to post seeing the condition of most of the country. We suffered thru those 100 degree days around the last of June and were getting really dry here too. But we have gotten about 5 to 6 inches of rain in about the last 4 weeks. Things have gone from dry as a bone to green everywhere, grass is growing good. PTL.
The corn growers here are going to have a smaller crop than normal, so much of it was pollinating during those real hot days, but it should make good silage as the rains have probably taken care of the high nitrate problem.
Anything can happen we still have ways to go till summer is over. I hope everbody gets some rain.

 

My cattle were in very good condition before the drought began, so they'll be fine. However, I was caught with a few too many head, so I had to sell some I would have liked to keep.

The grass in the pasture died. Dead, not dormant. I began feeding hay very early on, so I made a serious dent in my winter hay storage.

The Red River crabgrass I seeded last year waited until we finally got rain, and then practically jumped out of the ground. It took about 2 weeks for it to be tall enough that I could stop feeding hay.

I am rotating to let the crabgrass go to seed. I can't locate any crabgrass seed for sale. Nor lespedeza seed. Just white clover, and I'm reluctant to seed it because of the danger of bloat in the spring.

Now that I'm understocked, things are looking a little better, but it was a close call.

There is rain all around us again today. The radar shows it and we can hear the thunder, but it misses us, as usual.

I haven't finished cleaning up the fallen trees from Irene, so I'm of mixed feelings about wishing for a hurricane.

 

I split my herd - steers and replacement heifers (8 head) on the 40 acres of pasture and the cows and bull (12 total) into 20 acres of 10 year old clear cut woods and 10 acres of old beaver ponds think natural volunteer pasture/weeds - and 11 acres of mature hard woods. The mature cows were in there for around 7 or 8 weeks. The went in at BCS 7 and are around BCS 5 now.

Drought hit me some but really was not too bad in my location here is a picture of a calf born today. Can see my pasture but not really well. We had rain for the last couple of days so the grass seemed to have grown a couple of inches in a couple of days.

 

Heres a couple pictures of one of my pasture.

 

Things are looking much better here. It was so close. With the drought and high temps, I had never seen it so bad. We are still haying but the pastures are beginning to grow again and the temps have come down. Thank goodness for the rain. We are not getting alot but it has been fairly steady. Hopefully this will continue and the rains will come for everyone. I have a lot of family in Indiana and they have been hit terribly.

Hay is still available in this area at reasonable prices if you are able to transport it. I don't think there will be much of a second cutting though. Round bales are still holding at $25-30 range for 4x5s.

 

I've been able to sell hay at a good price, helps with the lack of corn. Other then that, I've feed some hay and put out protein tubs months early. I would have turned them out on some soybeans but were in the middle of corn harvest and I didn't have time to put up fence. Now we've gotten a few rains this week and greened stuff up. I haven't seen any pasture growth yet but it's not crunchy brown.

 

We had drought conditions last summer, hot and dry until it started raining in mid Oct.(I think). It rained enough over the winter to get the total rainfall total for the year close to the normal amount. I barely had enough hay to get through winter (a little over 3 months worth), plus I had a field of sorghum that wasn't worth harvesting for the cows.

It was mild over the winter, but I was able to make it to spring without selling any cows and I almost had enough hay (some wheat I drilled in the pasture and a little volunteer ryegrass in the sorghum field saved me from buying more hay).

It was wet and warm until about May, then it stopped raining and then it got hot (up to 114). The ponds went from overflowing in May to starting to dry up in August. I've barely got enough hay (a little more than last year), and I'm just now starting to bale another failed sorghum field to feed the cows this winter.

Even though nobody asked for advice, if you went through drought conditions this summer, I would start planning right now for a drought next summer. Ration out whatever hay you have to save it for even leaner times, don't start feeding any hay until you absolutely have to, think about selling some cows, and start thinking about how you are going to control any weeds or brush you have in your pastures because they are going to take off like you won't believe next year especially if you get some rain.

Until it rains in the summer when your warm season grasses are actively growing, they won't be fully recovered for this year's drought.

 

My spring and summer appear to have flip flopped. I'm trying to get more cattle but nobody around here wants to lease/board and I can't afford to buy.

 

We are feeding hay because our grass is pretty well burned up. Last year we had way too much rain and there was wide spread flooding in the midwest, but there is a big drought this year.