As grassfarmers you have probably heard me say that what we do is grow grass, right?  We then use cattle to harvest our crop.  Why would we want to burn pasture?

September and time to renovate some of our finishing pastures for winter grazing.  We use a no-till drill to plant grass seed into the ground.  This allows you to plant without having to disturb the soil by tillage.  In our steep to rolling hills the potential for soil erosion is significant.  A great advantage to this no-till planting is to conserve soil and decrease any erosion.

Another advantage is that we try to time the planting shortly after a rain.  Conventional methods of tilling would require for the pasture to dry out before disking.  Since you don’t remove the top layer and the soil is not directly exposed to the sun the soil retains moisture longer.  This promotes the germination of the grass seed.

“Grass fed” is not at this time legally defined.  The USDA did publish for comment a standard in May 2006 which if it passes into regulation will establish a grass fed standard.  This definition would allow the “Grass fed” label to be applied to animals whose energy/feed source for 99% of their life time has been from forage and herbage and no grain.  Simply put,” Grass fed” refers to those ruminants born, raised and finished on grass and forage (herbaceous plant material).  This minimal proposal by the USDA addresses the feeding practice only.

 Grass fed producers organized under the American Grassfed Association want the label “Grassfed” to mean the following primary points:
• Animals raised and finished 100% on a forage diet
• No antibiotics
• No synthetic growth hormones
• No grain or grain by-products
• No animal by-products
• Never confined or fed in a CAFO, but raised on pasture