Are you managing a new-to-you pasture and you need to determine how to stock it? Perhaps it has been recently purchased or rented, or you simply don’t trust the information provided on historical stocking rates.

The first principle of pasture management is to balance the available forage supply with livestock demand. Carrying capacity (also known as grazing capacity) is the amount of forage available for grazing animals in a specific pasture or field. A substantial amount of Canada’s rangeland is in some form of public ownership (e.g. grazing leases, forest grazing allotments) and has carrying capacity data available. With privately owned or recently acquired land however, there may not be any information on historical forage production and carrying capacity.

Carrying capacity can be calculated using a variety of techniques. All of them depend more or less on trial and error as they are monitored and adjusted over time as the carrying capacity for an individual year varies from the long-term average for the pasture. The effectiveness of each method depends on the kind of grazing land, but a combination of methods is generally required. Continue reading →