The utilisation of grazing systems will maximise pasture production and extend the grazing season on your horse property. As a horse owner you need to regard your pasture in much the same way that a farmer would.

Utilizing grazing systems will have many benefits for you, your horses, your property and the wider environment. It will also reduce your feed bills and reduce dust and mud.

Using grazing systems increases the productivity of the pasture and allows more flexibility in the amount of horses that can be kept on a particular piece of land. With the exception of set stocking, the grazing systems outlined here are all variations on the same theme of restricting horses to one part of the property while the other parts get to rest and recuperate. These systems can be used in conjunction with one another for good results. Aim to be flexible and be prepared to change systems to suit the current situation, for example different strategies will need to be used throughout the seasons in most parts of Australia.

In addition to utilizing grazing systems a good set of yards are required so that horses can be safely confined when necessary. Then time spent grazing can be increased when pasture is available and decreased when it is not. Supplementary feed is used to make up the shortfall in pasture. As pasture is improved over time the time spent grazing can be increased with less reliance on supplementary feed.

Set Stocking
Set stocking is the practise commonly used on horse properties whereby horses are allowed access to all of the land all of the time (either individually i.e. one horse per paddock or as a group i.e. the horses have access to the whole property all of the time). This practise usually leads to unhealthy land and unhealthy horses as the land gradually or quickly, depending on the land type, becomes degraded. Set stocking is to be avoided as a management practise on all but very large properties with very low stocking rates. In this situation cross grazing (see below) can be used to negate some of the effects of set stocking.

Rotational Grazing
Having several smaller paddocks rather than one large paddock allows the use of paddock rotation. In this system the horses are moved around the property as a herd. This improves pasture growth and parasite control and reduces land degradation. This method of management will help to prevent the under/over-grazing pattern present in so many horse paddocks.

Horses should be allowed to begin grazing a paddock when it has reached and average height of approximately 15 to 20cm. When they have grazed the paddock to an average height of 5 to 8cm they should be moved to another paddock. Any areas that have less than 70% ground cover or are bare, dusty or boggy should be temporarily fenced off with electric tape when the horses have access to the paddock. Bare areas should be covered with mulch and/or composted manure. Through a handful of grass seeds on to these areas and as long as it rains the bare area will revegetate.

When the animals are moved on, the now empty paddock can be harrowed, mowed to an even length and then rested and allowed to re grow. When the grass has again reached 15cm - 20cm again the horses can graze the paddock. The length of time that it takes the paddock to recover to an acceptable grazing length depends on factors such as the time of the year and the pasture species. If the situation occurs where none of the paddocks are recovered enough for grazing then the horses should be confined to the yards until they are.

Limited Grazing
This is the practice of removing horses from the pasture for part of each day in order to either conserve the pasture or to limit the amount of feed the horse consumes. This should still be carried out in conjunction with other systems such as rotation, strip grazing etc as the paddocks will still require a period of weeks or months with no grazing pressure and for paddock management practices such as harrowing to be carried out.

Limited grazing is a good strategy for making your available pasture last as long as possible. The horses must spend at least four hours and maybe as many as twelve hours (on good pasture) away from the paddock in order for conservation of pasture or reduced feed intake to be effective because horses will simply condense all of their eating time into the one long session if necessary. This said removing horses for a few hours each day while not reducing their total daily intake will reduce the amount of time spent loafing or sleeping in the paddock which will reduce land degradation. Horses cause just as much damage if not more to the land during these behaviours as when they are grazing. Another alternative is to let the horse graze for two or even three shorter periods per day rather than one long one.

Remember you must give horses hay if they are confined in yards or stables, they are not designed to go for long periods without fibre going through the gut.

Cross Grazing
Using other grazing animals has many advantages because they tend to compliment each other in their grazing behaviours, for example species each will eat around the dung of other species but not their own. This is thought to be a parasite prevention strategy because most parasites (worms) are host specific, which is, they can only complete their life cycle in one species of animal, so grazing animals instinctively avoid their own dung areas but not those of other species.

The most common animals used for cross grazing on horse properties are cows and sheep however any other grazing animal can be used such as goats, lamas and alpacas, emus and ostriches.

These animals can utilize the paddock either before; during or after the horse graze a paddock, depending on the feed availability. Horses tend to be dominant of other grazing animals including cows and smaller species do require an area that they can retreat to in small paddocks if they are to be grazed in with the horses.

Using different animal species to graze a paddock has many benefits. In addition to the different types of manure being deposited animals such as sheep for example eat woodier plants that horses leave including some weeds that are harmful to horses.

The disadvantages of cross grazing are that there are more mouths to feed when feed is short and there are extra expenses involved such as worming and foot care.

Cross grazing should only be considered when a property provides abundant feed for most of the year rather than a property that struggles to provide enough feed for its present occupants.

Strip Grazing
Strip grazing is a system of grazing that involves using a potable electric fence to allow animals to have access to a fresh strip of grass at regular intervals. This allows you to monitor how much the animals eat each day. This system can be used in conjunction with other grazing systems such as rotational grazing, for example the animals are still rotated around paddocks but are strip grazed across each paddock in turn. This method results in more even grazing as the animals move slowly, day by day, across the paddock rather than eating what they want and trampling the rest. It is more labour intensive than just turning the animals into the whole paddock as the fence must be moved on a regular basis so that the grazed area does not get too short. This method is especially advantageous for use with horses that put weight on too easily and are at risk of associated conditions. With this method the horses get a fresh but controlled amount of feed each day.

Other advantages are that horses are more likely to get on with eating and are less likely to run around the paddock due to the smaller available paddock size. If you are picking up manure it is easier to both find and pick up as it is concentrated into a smaller area and it is in the short grass side of the paddock.

This method requires portable electric fencing with ether a portable energiser or if the perimeter fence is electric then the portable fence can be joined into that.

Limitations to this system can depend on where the paddock water is positioned. The water may need to be transported to the section that the horses are using.

Block Grazing
If the paddock is going to take several weeks to graze using strip grazing then a second electric fence can be added behind the horses so that they cannot go back over the area that they have already grazed. This area can then be maintained (harrowed, mowed etc).

By Jane Myers, Equiculture