Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Aldeer General Forum Greg Judy and Cows

Why is this not becoming more popular…..or is it happening and we just don’t see it yet??......It seems to make so much more sense for the cattle and the wildlife……



He’s about to turn the herd loose on this one for a second grazing in July which will create a new flush of late summer growth emerging……What am I missing??......This seems like a no brainer for producing the best wildlife forage……Is it just a matter of the “old way” pushing against change or is this not as viable as it seems?

There’s a guy, here, that does it and requires it when he leases out his cattle land. Lotta research and thought put into it and he’s adamant about it.

What’s the going rate for a grazing lease??.....I think Greg leases most of his farms

Not sure. I never asked and rarely see him, now, since we moved to the other side of town. Apparently whatever he was asking was fair, as he always had somebody’s cows on it. He’s a retired dentist and always had a couple’a thousand acre “management” hobby places. The previous had about every species, huntable, to its near full potential for the area. Deer, turkey, small game, ducks, big hogs….now his hobby acreage is the above style cattle operation. Still not sure if he high fenced it before or after the cattle idea, though. Around 1100ac inside.

My FIL leases a good bit of land for cattle up in north Alabama……He told me one time what he was paying for a lease but I forget what it was now……I remember it was a good bit more than the per acre cost of hunting rights

He said the best height to graze big blue stem was when its about 18-24 inches......The average turkey hen is 30-37 inches tall at the head....just sayin

Yep, same Doc says he moves them at. "Says" it saves a load on med treatments, since worms live in the lower few inches and the cows don't get to graze down that far.

My in laws lease 400 acres of pasture to a cattle rancher in North Alabama. They worked out a lease arrangement with a lower cash basis but has requirements for land/fence/road maintenance. This guy leases multiple properties and has full time ranch hands so that works for him.

CNC the answer is as always it depends. Yes some of his ideas work here, some don’t. The trample part every so often has worked for me and I am seeing species that were not prevalent before that are now. Some of the things he espouses doesn’t work as well as if you are on a primary fescue rotation like he is. We have Bahia and Bermuda. Very different than fescue.

Do I think rotational grazing is better for ruminants and wildlife? Yes. To the extent he says, I am not sold.

I am also running cows through small understory burns to see how it responds very non scientifically. It’s been interesting.

What are the things that you are not sold on??.....I’m genuinely asking……From the perspective I’m looking at it I don’t see how you could do anything better than adding grazers to your toolbox……Keep in mind that its still just a tool no different than fire and the outcomes depend on how you use it……Greg is using them to maximize forage output for cattle with the wildlife benefits being secondary……If we reverse those two and put wildlife first then we would likely tweak a few things….

For example, I think I would purposely let the cattle over graze some of those stands of native grass ever so often just to thin them out some……That would be a big no-no for Greg but for someone wanting a little better plant spacing for quail and turkey it might be exactly what you want to do….. I’m just illustrating the “tool” being used to create different outcomes……and being sold on it really just depends on what you use the cattle to create…….(assuming we don’t kill a bunch in the process or tank animal performance and cause a bunch of issues that way).....To me it looks like adding "ruminants" to your tool box by far gives you the greatest potential to produce the best outcomes......It gives you the ability to manage in certain ways that just cant be replicated with anything else

Just to add a little bit more to that to illustrate what I’m talking about with there not being many, if any, other feasible ways of replicating what the cattle do…..

One of the biggest issues that we have with turkeys has to do with plant structure…….the density and the height…….Just like Greg said in that video, if you don’t graze big blue stem it will get 5 to 6 feet tall and the best time to graze it is when its 2 ft tall…….Which one is the turkey gonna like better??......Of course, they are going to by far prefer it to stay 12-24 inches tall and we have the ability to keep it in that optimal stage with cattle in a manner you just cant replicate…….They not only take the vegetation back down to optimal height but they trample a bunch down creating patchy “space” and optimal density as well…….or at least something closer to it......and we're talking about resetting this optimal structure on 4-8 week cycles give or take......not every 2-3 years.......It seems like a no brainer from the habitat standpoint.....My bigger concern is killin $2000 cows

Btw……not to mention the fact that the cattle are fertilizing everything in the process and stimulating the seed bank and creating more diversity of annuals, etc…….What's not to be sold on and how else would you replicate all of those things?? That’s the reason I asked the question in the beginning …”What am I missing here?”…..because it sure doesn’t seem to be anything to do with habitat outcomes……

I suppose there’s different ways of accomplishing the same thing but its seems like this would be one of the reasons for continuing to use fire in the rotation…….to control woody vegetation that the cows don’t eat……..either that or you gotta bush hog it, disk it, spray it, or get a goat crew maybe…..…….A little patch of woody brush here and there for structure and cover wouldn’t be a bad thing….……You just wouldnt want it to slowly take over

I understand you are passionate about this, but I have never enjoyed hunting around cows.

They always find a way to mess up a hunt, and deer don't seem to like being around them. I have seen cows chase deer away from feeders in South Texas when I was hog hunting, so this is not just sour grapes. I have also seen deer just melt away when the cows got close.

I have a buddy that’s been doing this successfully for two years now.

It’s definitely good for the soil.

Some drawbacks are:

1- major time commitment, have to move them daily. The average AL cow rancher also has a day job.

2- most of today’s cow breeds are soft and won’t respond the best to being in full sun all day.

3- keeping access to water nearby is inconvenient.

Yep……breed selection and water are gonna be two major factors……As far as time goes….I think someone could run a low stocking rate across a large area and accomplish similar goals rather than having to move them all the time from one small to paddock to another……They also have technology now that allows someone to run them without fencing…..Its like E-collars for cows…..Not for sure how economical they’ve made it but that would be pretty cool to be able to just draw out a new area on your phone versus actually having to move fencing

Let me ask you this…..If someone messed up one of your hunts with a controlled burn would you be against burning??.......I get it but at the same time I wouldn’t throw the benefits out the door because of the potential that a cow might mess up a hunt…..The benefits far out weigh the negatives as far as the wildlife are concerned…..

I’d also add that if someone is rotationally grazing like in the videos above then the cattle are confined to a fairly small paddock…..they arent just roaming around…..They are basically acting like a landscaping crew and you know exactly where they will be working on any given day

Just a side note to this……I don’t really consider myself to be “passionate” about this………..I see this in much more practical terms……Like if you asked me why your engine wasn’t running correctly and I told you that your carburetor was out of tune and running too rich and here’s how you fix that……..Its practical nuts and bolts engineering of structure....…its not emotional......I guess the “passion” comes in with trying to get other folks to hear it…….

I’d like to see the true potential realized on one of these high end places so that there’s a blue print and a standard set for what it can be if done right…..That’s how the snowball effect starts with other “plantations” following suite……No offense to anyone but if its just a bunch of individuals attempting to try something that they haven’t really researched or grasped the concepts of……then it’ll be just like throw and mow where a bunch of folks do it wrong and then claim it to not work like advertised……

I use a dozen Texas longhorns and a combination of fixed and single tape electric which they’ll stay in as long as there’s grass. Great for doves. Deer avoid them worse than coyotes. The field the cows are in is worthless for deer hunting as well as paddocks immediately adjoining. Just my observation.

How long have you been doing this??......This is just me guessing but I would think that the deer behavior would change over time as you started cycling in generations of does that were born and raised around the cattle…..