02-Lancaster Farming Saturday, July 1,1989 Wanger Shows Champ At Penna Fair Sheep Show BENSALEM (Bucks Co.) Competition was tough at the Pen nsylvania Fair’s first annual open sheep show. A total of 68 head were shown in classes for Suffolk, Columbia, Hampshire, Shrop shire, and Dorset. Judge Tim Flcener of Robesonia also selected champion market lambs. Lee and Louise Wanger of Eas ton exhibited the champion pair of Dorsets, of which the ewe was judged to be supreme champion of the show. William MacCauley of Phoe nixville showed a ram and ewe that Beef Briefs JfL TTA M NO ADVANTAGE FOR ROTATIONAL GRAZING? I was fortunate enough to attend the recent annual meeting of the American Forage and Grassland Council. One of the research pre sentations ended with the follow ing statement: “There is no advan tage to using an intensive grazing system as compared to a continu ously grazed pasture.” This seems to contradict many of the results found when comparing these sys tems, so it does require a little clos er look. The work was done in Virginia in the last year by Dr. Vivian Allen. The study compared cows with calves and yearlings on either a 16-paddock, intensively grazed system or a continuously grazed pasture system. For (he cows and yearlings, the pastures were fescue and red and white clover. Six cows and their calves and six yearlings were grazed on eight acres in the intensive system, with the year lings grazing ahead of the cows to remove SO percent of the standing forage. All calves were allowed to creep graze the next paddock. £bout 55 percent of the pasture was grazed by the cows during the early part of the season, while the remaining 45 percent was harvested for hay, with regrowth then being grazed. On August 1, the yearlings were removed and the smaller portion was fertilized with 80 pounds of nitrogen per acre and stockpiled for fall grazing. The continuous system again used S 3 percent of the pasture for grazing by the cows. The remain der was used for yearlings and creep grazed by the calves with the excess being cut for hay. On August 1, the yearlings were removed, the pasture was fertil ized, and the growth was stock piled for fall grazing. The results showed cow weights and total gains per acre of calves and yearlings were greater for the continuous system compared to the rotational one. While differ ences between the systems was not great for the calves, yearlings gained .2 pounds per day more and HAY REQUIRED FOR METABOLIZABLE E AT DIFFERING MATURITY (LBS; HAY PER DAY) Requirement Early Midbloom Late (ME kg) Harvest Harvest Harvest Cattle Class Pregnant Heifers Dry Cows * Lactating Cows beat out the competition for champion Suffolk honors. Top Columbia honors went to produc ers from Flemington, N.J. LMZ Columbias showed the champion ram, while theZachman family led out the champion ewe. The champion Shropshire ram was owned by Wey Farm of Kutz town, and the champion ewe was out of the Gold Star Shrops herd, which is in Fleetwood. Wey Farm also did well in with their Hamp shires, coming home with both champion ram and ewe honors. In the market lamb division, by John Comerford Penn State Beef Specialist cows weighed 69 pounds more in the fall on the continuous system. However, hay harvest was almost twice as high in the rotational pastures. Have we been making a mis take, then, in promoting the use of rotational grazing systems? I don’t think so. First, the use of the stockpiled fescue is a key to the success in this type of program. Fescue, for all its apparent disadvantages, can be stockpiled and provide some excellent fall grazing. Dr. Harold Harpster here at Penn State is cur rently running a trial with sheep to find some fescue varieties that will suit Pennsylvania. Our fall is somewhat shorter in most areas of the state compared to Virginia, so we cannot usually expect to get the advantage of fall grazing com pared to more southern areas. Secondly, this was a pretty good ' continuously grazed system. It was designed to take full advantage of matching forage growth with livestock needs by employing dif ferent classes of cattle, creep graz ing, and stockpiling. Finally, these results may .change over time because of years with more “nor mal” rainfall and a change in com position of the forages in the pastures. As these things usually do, it was interesting hear this concept of grazing systems had come full cycle and some negatives were being “discovered.” However, don’t sell any of the electric fence just yet. FEED VALUE AND HAY MATURITY The constant rain through May and now extending into June has caused a serious delay in hay harvest over most of the state. It has now reached the point where feed quality is being effected. Pro ducers should remember two things in this regard: feed quality is is reduced as the hay becomes more mature/and it will therefore take more pounds of hay next wint er to meet the nutritional needs of the cow. The following table using alfalfa will illustrate the effect of increasing maturity on feed value. 17.1 16.4 19.2 Kennianne Rarrick of Fleetwood won the purple rosette, while a lamb exhibited by the'Saul FFA chapter captured the reserve Spot Proposed Watershed Project Announced MORGANTOWN, WV. A watershed protection project is proposed for the Reedy Creek Watershed to reduce excessive erosion and improve grass and legume cover oh pastureland. Reedy Creek drains 84,100 acres in Roane and Wirt counties. If the project is approved, local farmers will receive accelerated technical .assistance and cost sharing to plan and install erosion control measures. The local sjionsor is the Little Kanawha Soil Conservation Dis trict. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Soil Conservation Service (SCS) would provide technical and financial assistance. A pre-authorization planning report is scheduled to be com pleted in October. The 440 farms in the watershed average 150 acres in size. The major enterprise is beef cattle, with a small number of sheep farms. Of the 13,340 acres of pas ture, 8,010 acres have been identi fied as needing treatment For the dry cows and steers there -should be no problem in meeting needs even with more mature hay. The crunch comes on the pregnant heifers and the lactating cows. It becomes questionable with these two'groups if they can consume enough of the mature hay to meet their needs on a daily basis. We frequently recommend the use of a forage analysis on hay to deter mine the actual vale. If there ever is a time to take advantage of this information, it .is years like this when there will be some pretty wide variation in the quality of the hay being made. CATTLEMAN’S FIELD DAY The Pennsylvania Cattleman’s Field Day will be held at South Mountain Farm near Gettysburg on July 15 starting at 9:30 a.m. This should be a great day for fam ilies, 4-H and FFA members, and anyone interested in the beef busi ness to attend. The program will include a judging contest, hoof trimming demonstration, fencing demonstration, a discussion of feeding Holstein steers for beef, and updates from the Pennsylvania Cattleman’s Association and the Beef Council. A special feature of the program will be a panel discussion about the problems and opportunities in the beef business. Several large and small operators will discuss the things they think are important in their operation and what they believe the opportunities are for the future. Also included are tours of the nearby battlefield, the inno vative and progressive Mason- Dixon Dairy Farm, and Mary and Ray Grimes’ South Mountain Farm Charolais herd. Lunch will include the “Keystone Ribeye Steak on a Roll” at a reasonable cost of $2. Make plans to attend, and if you need any other information contact me or Dr. Lowell Wilson. ;nergy needs 20.1 22.2 24.4 19.4 20.7 22.3 22.4 24.2 26.6 Lee Wanger has a firm grip on his Dorset fewe, which was named the supreme champion of the first annual Pennsyl vania Fair open sheep show. Lawsuits Settled On Hereford Perfection Butt KANSAS CITY, MO. The American Polled Hereford Asso ciation (APHA) has settled seven lawsuits, which sought $4OO mil lion in damages, regarding the 1986 expungement of the bull KLC RB3 Perfection from the APHA record. A special litigation committee of the APHA board, working with attorneys for both sides, nego tiated an out-of-court settlement approved by the APHA Board by an 11 to 1 vote on June 13. This agreement involves no financial payment to plaintiffs, and will save the association an estimated $200,000 to $500,000 in further costs. Committee members are Bill Yowcll, Killeen, Texas, Dex ter Douglass, Tallahassee, Fla., and Orville K. Sweet, Panora, lowa. Both sides agreed to a court order of dismissal that provides* 1. Perfection is placed on per manent ineligible status for registration in the association, and no animals sired by him conceived after Aug. 1,1989, will be eligible for registration in any APHA record. 2. Perfection progeny will, upon proper individual applica tion, be recorded T>y APHA and issued a certificate with a perma nent “L” prefix to the registration number rather than the “X” prefix normally assigned to Polled Here fords. “L” animals will be issued a pedigree certificate to be designed by the APHA, but may be of a dif ferent color than “X” certificates, and will contain different certifi cation language and a footnote explaining that Perfection’s dam is included on the certificate based on the affidavit of his breeder. Any future animal with an “L” prefix animal in its pedigree will only be eligible as an “L”. No pro vision was made for “L” animals to become “X” animals. 3. “L” animals may be shown in Polled Hereford National and APHA-sponsored SOP shows beginning in November 1990, under the conditions as may be approved by the APHA Board in its sole discretion. “L” animals can show in other shows under rules set by each individual show. 4. “L” animals may participate in sanctioned bull tests and perfor mance programs. They may be advertised in the breed’s official publication, Polled Hereford World, and may be issued artifi cial insemination and donor dam permits, all in accordance with APHA By-Laws and rules. S. In all activities and advertis ing, these animals are required to be identified by their “L” prefix numbers. 6. Perfection’s breeder, Willard Keith, Owensboro, Ky., perma nently resigned his membership from the APHA and has agreed to never own, show or be actively involved with Polled Hereford cattle. 7. All parties executed mutual releases. Ken Harwell, spokesman for the Kansas City-based APHA, said, “We welcome the resolution of this matter and look forward to working again with those breeders who were inactive during the liti gation period.”
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