N RANCHING
atural Resources
growth if temperatures stay above normal. Despite my positivity, most of the region is still in extreme drought, but with the recently improved conditions we can look forward to a green spring.
South Texas Jose de la Luz “Pepe” Martinez, rangeland management specialist, USDA-NRCS It has been a while since South Texas has had good
moisture in the ground such as it has experienced now in early 2015. We saw a good response from winter crops and
winter weeds in the fi rst few months of the year, but our rangeland is still waiting for warmer weather to respond. There is a saying in Mexico, “Febrero loco, Marzo
otro poco.” (Crazy February, even crazier March.) This means that if the scattered cold fronts and small rain events in this region continue all the way to April, we are not going to have production of grass (green-up) until mid-April. The good news is that the potential for forage pro- duction is higher this year than it has been in the last
3 years. Take advantage of the conditions and imple- ment practices like prescribed burning or a mechani- cal treatment to increase aeration and infi ltration, so the land is ready to produce whenever we do get those warmer temperatures.
We stand to enter the spring season with a soil moisture
profi le for the fi rst time since 2010, which puts us in a
good position to start forage growth in the spring.
Coastal Prairie Stephen W. Deiss, rangeland management special-
ist, USDA-NRCS Standing dead forage has held up well in our area in spite of the rains during late fall and early winter. Soil temperatures remained
below the threshold for nearly all warm-season perennial grass growth earlier this year. On land where grazing has cleared signifi - cant amounts of what would be standing dead forage this time of year, some early-season grasses be- came available. On those areas which have been
deferred from grazing, there was very little green-up in the fi rst 2 months of the year, indicating a need to use these areas a bit more heavily (preferably by livestock with a low nutrient requirement, such as dry cows). This will tend to boost some
green-up when soil temperatures increase. The tradeoff this year will likely
Redstem fi laree 54 The Cattleman April 2015
be a great fl ush of forbs (weeds), some of which are not used by live- stock. The precipitation we have re-
thecattlemanmagazine.com
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