Fall Improvements for Irrigated Pastures

Fall Improvements for Irrigated Pastures

Washington State University Extension Regional Forage Specialist Steve Norberg shares tips ranchers can consider for improving their irrigated pasture this time of year.
Norberg: “Well in pastures this time of year, they should be thinking about is fertilization for the following year. This is the time of year that tillers for next year’s production are being initiated so you need to make sure you have adequate phosphorous and potassium, particularly this time of year. Nitrogen — you don’t want to put a heavy dose down because it can actually cause your forage to try and keep growing through the winter and cause winter injury. You do definitely want to get your phosphorous and potassium on and that requires a soil sample to know what the needs are.”
Norberg adds that this is also the time of year to consider broad leaf weed control.
Norberg: “This is the time to control perennial weeds you’ve got about a month before frost is going to occur. So you’ve got that time period to go in. The first thing to do is to identify what your broad leaf weeds are. Find out what kind of herbicide works on that kind of weeds and attack it. Fall is a marvelous time to attack perennial broad leaf weeds in pastures.”
For dryland pastures, Norberg urges ranchers to leave adequate amount of forage this fall to allow regrowth to occur. If you want less weeds next spring he says, you need to maintain levels of grazing that will not hurt regrowth.

 

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