Demonstrations

 

Pasture Improvement

Pastures can be improved by allowing goats to graze them. The following pictures show the effects of 28 goats plus kids grazing a lake dam for eight days at SIPAC.

The dam before the goats started grazing. Notice the overgrowth and scrub trees.	Another view of the dam before the goats started grazing.	Goats grazing on the first day of the demonstration.
A view of the dam after eight days of grazing. Much of the smaller scrub trees and shrubs were defoliated.	The goats at work grazing the dam on day eight.	More goats grazing the dam on the last day of the demonstration.

 

Turnip Grazing Trial

A demonstration was done using 50 head of goats to determine if grazing turnips would be successful. The goats were grazed from 10/27/08 to 12/4/08 on 11 acres of land. As fed the turnip yield was 16.5 ton/acre. The dry matter yield was 1.41 ton/acre. The seed cost of the turnips was $23.22/ton dry matter. Nitrogen was also applied to the pastures just after a rain, which cost $700/ton applied.

A picture of the turnip pasture.	The goats grazing the turnips.	After grazing the vegetative matter, many livestock also eat the turnip bulbs. However, goats do not graze the bulbs as readily.