Don’t let Pricklypear Steal Your Grazing Potential

Beef producers don’t look kindly on cattle rustlers. So, it’s no surprise they don’t like uncontrolled pricklypear cactus growth robbing them blind of prime grazing lands.

“There are ranches near us that didn’t keep mesquite and pricklypear under control,” says Larry Guy, who runs his family’s Rafter L Ranch near Abilene, Texas. “They’re now out of the cow business. It will take over.”

Pricklypear thrives across the Southwest in part, because it has adapted to the environment.

“Pricklypear is a challenge in this region because it’s very well-adapted to our climate. It has figured out how to survive in some not-so-friendly situations,” explains Matthew Coffman, a rangeland management specialist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

Tough conditions? No problem.

Pricklypear is an especially opportunistic plant. When drought or other factors stress most vegetation, such as forage grasses, pricklypear capitalizes and gobbles up more ground.

“It moves quicker than people expect,” Coffman says. “During a drought, pricklypear can expand by 25 to 30 percent [per year].” And that’s 25 percent to 30 percent less land where grasses and other desirable range plants can grow.

“What’s especially aggravating about pricklypear is that it limits forage production greatly,” explains James Jackson, with Texas A&M AgriLife Extension. “Quite a bit of grass grows under a mesquite tree. But under a pricklypear plant, it is impossible.”

Coffman’s work in West Texas illustrates just how much pricklypear hammers grazing potential.

For example, on one section-size pasture in Fisher County, where Coffman estimated pricklypear canopied 66 percent of the ground, he pegged the losses at more than 80,000 pounds of grazable forage production. If an animal unit (AU) requires 10,950 pounds of forage annually, reclaiming grazing space from pricklypear gives that pasture the potential to support an additional seven AUs (AU = mature, 1,000-pound cow).

Pricklypear’s Impact on Grazeable Acres and Production

Location: Fisher County Texas
Pricklypear Canopy Cover: 66 percent
Source: Matthew Coffman, USDA-NRCS

• 640 acres x 34 percent = 218 grazable acres
• Forage production = 760 pounds per acre
• 760 x 25 percent grazing efficiency = 190 grazable pounds of forage per acre
• 190 pounds of forage per acre x 422 acres lost to pricklypear = 80,180 pounds of additional forage
• 1 AU requires 10,950 pounds of forage per year
• 80,180 of forage ÷ 10,950 = 7 AUs

“When you consider that during the time I completed this forage inventory, 500- to 600-pound calves were bringing $642 to $870 at auction in San Angelo, it’s pretty easy to see how pricklypear directly impacts your bottom line,” Coffman says. “If each of the seven additional cows that pasture now supports produces a 500-pound calf, revenue from the 640 acres could increase by almost $4,500 annually at current market prices. That’s $7 from every acre.”

Restore pricklypear acres faster

Cattlemen now can make land covered by pricklypear productive again, faster. MezaVue™ herbicide — a new, more effective, faster-acting herbicide control option from Corteva Agriscience™, Agriculture Division of DowDuPont — provides early visual signs of activity and a faster, higher level of control than the product used now in most aerial applications on pricklypear.

Pricklypear cactus is notoriously slow to show symptoms and die. With three active ingredients, MezaVue is absorbed more thoroughly and causes a distinct yellowing of pear pads within three to four months of application. With the old aerial standard (Tordon® 22K herbicide), absorption was slower and yellowing could take a year or longer, depending on environmental conditions.

“Faster symptoms with MezaVue herbicide deliver a peace-of-mind benefit that the herbicide is working,” says Jillian Schmiedt, Range & Pasture product manager for Corteva Agriscience. “Faster control means native grasses are able to respond sooner to get rangeland back into production. And the more cactus you control, the more of that area you open to grazing.”

Pricklypear is susceptible to MezaVue almost any time of year when the air temperature is above freezing and the plant can be adequately covered with herbicide. Aerial applications have been most effective as the plant finishes its growth cycle in late summer and fall before new pads have hardened. That’s typically August through October. Where the cactus is mixed with mesquite, aerial applications may be more effective when mesquite is dormant, so foliage won’t intercept the herbicide before it reaches the cactus. That’s typically February through April.

MezaVue™ herbicide also is gentler on over-sprayed, nontarget oak trees. In West Texas aerial trials, oaks have tolerated MezaVue better than existing options, and recovered from any effect sooner.

See for yourself how much faster MezaVue gets the job done on pricklypear and learn more about the new standard for pricklypear control at MezaVueHerbicide.com.

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™®Trademarks of Dow AgroSciences, DuPont or Pioneer, and their affiliated companies or their respective owners. MezaVue and Tordon 22K are Restricted Use Pesticides. MezaVue is not registered for sale or use in all states. Contact your state pesticide regulatory agency to determine if a product is registered for sale or use in your state. Always read and follow label directions. ©2018 Dow AgroSciences LLC