Friendly Flock

Recovery vs Rest.

Before getting into how to determine the right recovery time, I wanted to define the difference between rest and recovery. Recovery is when the plant actively grows, as rest is the total period where the prairie has no grazing. So recovery happens mainly in the growing season.

With that in mind, let’s look at how to determine the right recovery period for a pasture, you need to take into account several factors:
Grazing pressure, soil fertility, weather, season, plant species community and personal objectives . Let’s examine each of them:

Grazing pressure

The more leafs are taken of the grass, the more time they need to recover from that grazing event.

I did a little experiment in spring with a heavy grazing and a light grazing event, after the same amount of recovery (30days) the heavy grazing was not ready to be grazed while the light was:

On the right side is the heavy grazing on the left the light grazing event.

But, the grazing pressure is dependent on the season. Heavy grazing events early in the season (spring) will slow down growth more than when there is no growth (Dry summer or Snow in winter). The regrowth after a heavy grazing event in those seasons is not significantly slower.
When the plant is preparing for winter it usually stores energy down the in the root. When the plant is heavily grazed then, it will also have a slower regrowth the following growing season.

Seasons

One grazing principal is to move the animals fast when growth is fast and slow down the moves when grass growth slows down.
This is because when grass growth fast, the recovery time is lower, so when you move your animals fast through your paddocks, the recovery time of each paddock will be lower.
Usually in our context (France) a rest period of 30-60 days is adequate for fast growth (usually spring).

When the growth slows down, and you slow down the movements of the animals, the recovery period will automatically increase even if you don’t change the number of the paddocks. Usually when grass stops growing, a rest period of 120-180 days is sufficient.

Plant species

There are plants that recover more slowly than others. For example winter annuals recover very fast in the right conditions.
As some plants need a whole year to recover from a grazing event like for example Aphyllanthes monspeliensis.

Legumes usually take longer than grasses to recover, so when you plan to increase the number of legumes in a pasture, plan for longer recovery times.

So it is important to know your plant species and which you want to favour. Which brings us to objectives.

Objectives

The recovery time you choose will depend a lot on your goals and objectives.
Let’s say you have a paddock, with a lot of bare ground, and your objective would be to decrease bare ground and increase productivity.
In a case like that you would then choose a longer recovery period so the existing stand can develop and create seeds. It would also create a lot more biomass with whom you can cover the soil.

In another scenario, where you need a productive pasture with a lot of protein in the plants, let’s say for calving or lambing. You would chose shorter recovery periods for those pastures, because when grasses go over a certain stage of development they will lose on quality.

It is important though to change objectives for a field. That the field you let go to seed one year maybe next you will graze for calving and vice versa.

Soil fertility

Soil fertility is also very important when it comes to recovery. The more fertile, the faster the plants grow. So in less fertile soils longer recovery is very important.

Weather

Last but not least, weather. When you have optimal growth conditions, so enough water and the right temperature, growth is faster. But in a drought for example growth is slower so the recovery time increases.

But at the end it comes down to experience and observation. But I hope I could give you an idea on how to determine the right recovery time, when we just start out.