In the world of working grasslands, grazing management is as diverse as the operations it serves.
For some ranchers, grazing is monitored, measured, analyzed and relied upon as a tool for successful everyday management of an operation.
For others, it’s an instinct — a gut-check moment of knowing when and where cattle need to be moved.
And there are a thousand other scenarios that lie somewhere in the middle of those extremes.
For ranchers who have a grazing management strategy and put it on paper in some way, the benefits can be numerous. A written grazing plan can add up to better productivity, an ability to capture more market opportunities and land management that buffers against extreme weather.
We talked to two ranchers in the Dakotas about how they are managing their grazing and making it work for their land, their operation, their profitability and, ultimately, their legacy.
The Ranchers
Chad Njos – Cow Chip Ranch
Purchasing a ranch south of Bowman, North Dakota in 1993, Chad and Amanda Njos established Cow Chip Ranch atop land previously used for small grain farming. Through holistic management and intensive rotational grazing, they are restoring the 5,000 acres to native prairie that is benefitting the health and production of their 300-head cow/calf operation. The Njos are grazing mentors for the North Dakota Grazing Lands Coalition.
Dan Rasmussen – The 33 Ranch
The 33 Ranch sits on generational land located in south central South Dakota and runs 400 cows and 1,100 yearlings annually on 22,000 acres, grazing as close to 52 weeks of the year as the Dakota climate will allow. With a vision of healthy land, healthy families and healthy livestock, the Rasmussens are operating with several generations on-ranch. Rasmussen is a grazing specialist with the South Dakota Grasslands Coalition.
Planning = Continuous Improvement
Both ranchers operate with a grazing management plan as part of a holistic management strategy.
Njos: “I have a spreadsheet with our past grazing and then I put together a grazing plan in the spring,” Njos says. “But those grazing plans are just a road map that I’m constantly adjusting.”
“I now have help on the ranch with my son and employees, so I am trying to transition all of the information in my head to the plan so that everyone is informed about what is going on.”
“We’re trying to be more deliberate about making plans that are understood by everyone in the operation versus just by me and my boss, who is myself.”
Rasmussen: “Holistic planning is often very difficult because people often don’t manage that way, but the bottom line in ranching is that there is a lot of complexity in managing a ranch’s many moving parts, and we can benefit as managers by having a tool to objectively manage all these moving parts.”
“Once people see the advantage of a holistic, all-ranch approach that encompasses people, finances, environment and livestock and understand that when you change one, and it changes the others, it is very powerful.”
Planning = Profitability
Both Njos and Rasmussen draw a direct line between their intensive grazing management, their holistic management plan and their bottom line. Njos says that his management has allowed the ranch to “more than double” their stocking rate and production on the land.
Rasmussen: “We converted these season-long grazing pastures to a rotation and saw an increase in production,” he says. “We saw a 30% increase just initially because of efficiency and the native plants that started to respond and that increase keeps getting better over time, which means our stocking rate can go up, too.”
“We can put a dollar value on that really easily,” he says. “I do custom stocking and if we covert 30% to a custom rate of $1 a day per yearling, that comes up with quite a few dollars.”
Planning = Security
Working with the land instead of against it has yielded some surprising benefits for both ranchers, including setting them up for success in weathering changing climate conditions.
Njos: “After a few years, I did see the land start to regress because I had increased production and was over-utilizing it,” he says. “Then we took a holistic management class again and we made some big changes to start working with nature and mimicking nature and focusing on soil health.”
“That included intensive grazing and looking at these pastures and trying to figure out how to better utilize them for livestock and regenerate them.” “It’s been amazing to see how resilient nature is when you work with it instead of trying to control it.”
Rasmussen: “We have green grass theoretically all summer because as the warm seasons mature and the first of September, the cool seasons start greening up again,” he says. “With just a little rain, we can have green grass for our cattle all summer.”
“Another advantage of the rotation and healthy soil is that we can grow the same amount of grass now on 14 inches of rain that took quite a bit more 30 years ago,” he says. “That’s how we can keep our herd numbers steady at under 14 inches of rain average.”
“With the rotational grazing, we are improving our drought tolerance.”
The Bottom Line
Both ranchers serve as mentors and consultants, helping other ranchers in their region understand that grazing management is part of a holistic strategy of success. We asked them what advise they lean on time and time again in those roles.
Rasmussen: “I’m a firm believer in education,” he says. “I don’t think we can go to enough workshops and schools because I learn something at every one I go to, whether I’m an instructor or a or a student.”
“The more we learn about managing this complex business, the better we can do it.”
Njos: “No matter what you’re doing, your management has to keep adjusting to what is happening,” he says. “Every change you make — like moving cattle, calving times or time of grazing — affects the whole. Be able to understand that, measure it, and then adjust.”
No matter how you manage your grazing, there are resources that can help. Visit www.trustinbeef.com/grazingmanagement for insights, organizations that can help and to get access to a free, step-by-step grazing management workbook to start getting your plan on paper now.
