With a warm, moist summer and early autumn, most areas have seen great pasture growth from a pure bulk Dry Matter (DM) perspective. Much of this pasture has high amounts of seed head and variable clover and ryegrass leaf components. This can be challenging for optimal young stock performance, but older stock performance can go off the boil, too.
Nutrition
Your pasture paddocks may be negatively impacting your stock’s rumen health.
Here’s how:
- Under high-growth autumn conditions, pasture looks good but is of lesser quality than spring pasture; and we often see a combination of the following — high pasture protein levels, average metabolisable energy, and variable effective fibre (NDF). Plus, low DM percentages.
- Rumen health can be compromised, showing up as poor liveweight gain, loose faeces, and even scouring.
- Pasture may have higher fungal counts containing various toxins impacting stock performance, such as facial eczema, Ryegrass staggers (endophyte), Zearalenone (Oestrogen based),
and ergot. - High nitrates and low fibre access hinders performance when stock grazes alternative non-pasture-based forages such
as brassicas. - Grazing forages containing high-oestrogen compounds—some older varieties of red clover dominant swards and pure lucerne swards under aphid pressure or fungal disease—can lead to altered ovulation rates in pre-tupping ewe hoggets.
Understanding the potential risks in your autumn feed, allows you to act where required, and plan, as these issues often reoccur.
Worm challenges
Warm, moist conditions not only allow worm larval counts to climb but are optimal for worm larvae survival. Worm challenge can become very high, even when using effective drenching programs.
Monitoring Faecal Egg Count (FEC) on various mobs determines worm pasture challenge at 28-days since last drench and helps map out hot areas on-farm. To reduce larval burdens and help with refugia, use well-conditioned, undrenched adult ewes following behind, the pastures grazed by lambs over summer. Alternatively, cattle can also graze these areas.
Transitioning stock onto alternative forage species, such as summer brassicas or herb dominant mixes, reduces larvae intake and contamination, leading to better stock performance.
Trace elements
Autumn pasture varies in its trace element content. Growing young stock, with high element demands, may face sub-clinical or true element deficiencies. To determine if supplementation is required, monitor the key trace elements influencing liveweight gain—Selenium (Se), Cobalt (Co), and Copper (Cu).
Other diseases
Diseases such as viral pneumonia, scabby mouth, footrot, and flystrike all rob lamb stock performance, so it is important to have strategies to minimise these risks. Cattle, on the other hand, are commonly affected by bacterial diseases, like yersinia, or viral diseases, like BVD. Autumn ill-thrift is very common but not attributed to a single factor. A multi-faceted approach, one relying on effective strategies to manage nutrition, worm burdens, and prevention, is necessary.
'Is my stock performing?'
High stock performance and a low emission footprint is in demand, and where you will find the greatest profitability. Regular weighing for accurate liveweight gain information gives you a better picture of how your stock is performing.
If they are not performing to your goals, then follow this checklist:
- Nutrition
- Worms
- Trace elements
- Other diseases
Early intervention keeps you and your stock on track.
For help with your stock performance, talk to you PGG Wrightson Technical Field Representative.
