Welcome to the Grazing Grass Podcast Episode 94.
be prepared. read as much as you can, shadow somebody that you think is doing a good job for you take courses
You're listening to the Grazing Grass Podcast, helping grass farmers learn from grass farmers, and every episode features a grass farmer and their operation. I'm your host, Cal Hardage.
On today's episode, we have Lee Sexton of Sexton Grazing and Consulting. Lee is from Canada, and he is a strong advocate of targeted grazing to control unwanted vegetation and improve soil health. Lee emphasizes the power of continuous learning and the impact of shared knowledge Today, Lee shares his grazing journey, exploring the experiences from shepherding to using tech for shared knowledge.
Before we talk to Lee, 10 seconds about my farm and as the patterns been for the last few weeks, we're going to talk about the podcast, but not this podcast. Last year in early 2023, I tried to experiment called the Grass Farmer Book Club. The approach was simple. Yeah, effective. By committing to read 10 pages a day for 5 days each week, we gradually expand our understanding and expertise in grazing. Last year I tried it. I did not like my voice being the only voice on it.
So after a few weeks, I stopped that experiment, but now we're revisiting it. Because I like the idea of the book club structure through a podcast for shared learning. If that appeals to you and you would be interested in being a guest reader on the podcast with me, would you go over to thegrassfarmerbookclub. com and click on be our guest and fill out the form. Give me a little bit of information and I'll be in contact with you. Enough about the new experiment. Let's talk to Lee.
Lee, we want to welcome you to the Grazing Grass Podcast. We're excited you're here today.
Thanks, Cal. I'm excited to be here. I'm really glad you reached out.
well, thank you Lee. To get started, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your operation?
Uh, currently I guess our operation is, uh. Kind of a twofold operation. We have a grass-based operation. We do yearling cattle, uh, mostly, uh, rotational grazing and, uh, side business that goes on with, uh, targeted grazing business as well. So I guess I'm away doing targeted grazing in the summer at times. And, uh, when I'm away, I have my grandkids hired to look after the rotations.
Uh, they usually do a three day move when I'm home, I'll do anywhere from a one to a three day, depending on what's going on.
So are you buying buying those cows in the spring and selling them in the fall?
So we have both, uh, custom people that pay and, uh, I buy some as well. Uh, I guess last year we, we run about 110 yearlings. It's not a very big outfit.
well, just enough that you can keep your grandkids busy.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's, I feel very comfortable, uh, when I'm gone with them doing it. They've developed quite a g grier's eye. Um, they're 16 to 22, so, uh, the three kids that are involved. So it works out well.
Oh, very good. Yes. And where are you located?
I'm located at Hanley Saskatchewan, Canada. We're just south of a beautiful city called Saskatoon, so most people get tied up on that Saskatoon Saskatchewan thing.
I'm sure I would, I, I have trouble with the towns in Oklahoma, so we won't even try that. Now, Lee, how long have you been doing this?
I've been involved in, in some form of agriculture. Most of my life, uh, I guess in the early years as a youngster, I, uh, spent every minute I could, any extra day from school. I spent my grandfather's place, uh, in them years. It was like a 30 mile drive, and it was, it was not easy to communicate in those years. Um, but uh, every holidays that, you know, like Christmas holidays or all summer, I was usually at, at the farm.
And, uh, my, my father was very interested in horses and we lived in town, but, uh, we, we rented a, you know, place for, to keep horses over the years until, uh, oh, I don't know what it was, 30 some years ago, I guess I lost my dad. And that kind of started my own journey. Uh, I had some horses there. To look after. And I finally got a place of my own at that point, I guess Cal, and,
Oh
me, it was, uh, grass alfalfa actually is what it was. Straight alfalfa. So I hated that for a while and got tired of that because, uh, all this time I was working full-time, uh, managing a haying operation or an irrigated forge program, uh, supplying feed for, uh, a program for the federal government. Uh, so anyway, I, it was time consuming and doing my own hay got to be quite a tough deal. So then I, uh, I read an article and, uh, started grazing. I started grazing straight alfalfa.
I'll be honest, that's, I broke my teeth wide open on that. Um, I think we had something like 50 heifers come in on the quarter section. At that time, I was living closer to Outlook, then Outlook, Saskatchewan. Uh, rotated them. I had read an article about a guy in southern Southeast Saskatchewan, uh, doing some grazing, and, uh, I broke up my quarter section into, uh, eight paddocks for the cattle. And I had two other places for horses.
So, uh, I started rotating cattle on straight alfalfa and got that going. And I received a stock dog, I guess, for Christmas from my family one year. And that got the bug going for the start training the dog. So I bought a few sheep, uh, trained this darn dog and that led me into another journey, another rabbit hole. I guess it was really, it started, uh, found out that I could, uh, get them sheep bread and have some little ones and started making a little money off of that as well.
So we grew that business over an outlook instead of, I started grazing the sheep on the alfalfa instead of the cattle. So we'd done that and then moved, I guess we've been over here about 22 years. So
Oh yes. Now on grazing alfalfa,
yeah.
I'm in northeast Oklahoma. Alfalfa, there's no, no alfalfa around here. If you wanna buy alfalfa, you gotta go out to western Oklahoma, Western Kansas, and truck it in. And when we dared, we used to do that, but I've never grazed alfalfa. However, what I've read you, you gotta take some precautions with grazing it. Did you have any trouble grazing alfalfa?
Uh, I did with the sheep, uh, the very first time. Uh, but I was just impatient with the cattle. I never had any problems. Uh, I had a, a field, a small field where my dugout was, that was grass. So I put them in there when they first arrived, uh, overnight and in the morning they grazed, uh, in there. And, uh, just after dinner they, you know, kind of full and they were laying down.
And, uh, that's when I went down and kicked the gate open to the alfalfa and kind of moved them out in there slowly. And from there on it was just kind of fly by the seat of your pants. You had to have more guts and glory on it and, uh, just moved them right, moved. Didn't put no pressure on things. Uh, I found, they told me the secret was to move them before you had to kind of thing.
Wonderful. Yes. And you said the sheep gave you a little bit more trouble with it though.
Yeah, I got impatient. I was working and haying and I went, it was in the spring. Uh, I guess we weren't haying yet, but I was trying to irrigate and just busy time. And I went out in the morning. I was, I was going by to work and I kicked them out into the field and, uh, I guess I lost five that morning. Uh, my own stupidity. yeah. I, I thought they'd be okay. They were on full feed overnight, but, but after that I didn't have any more problems.
I just held the program like I did with the cattle. I guess I had smaller paddocks, um, that I was rotating through. I broke it up from eight to, I think I had a dozen then, but
Oh yeah. And you did that for a few years till you moved to your current place.
That's right. Um. I wanted to live on the place, and it's a major road. They rerouted a highway and all the heavy traffic come down our road. So I started looking around. I found this one at the end of a trail and she's pretty peaceful here. And, uh, we, we managed to, to buy it and get the other one sold. And we live right here, I guess we've been here 22 years and I still kind of consider myself a bit of a newbie around here, but That's okay.
Oh, yes. I, I think that's funny. We, so the area we live in, we're about 10 miles from a small town here and. Most people here in the area I live, they, they commute to that town or, or more further away to work. But when we moved out here, um, my grandparents lived out here and we moved out here to be close to them, and we started dairying with them. But there was like a handful of families I could count on my hand of who lived out here and who had lived out here for decades.
And since then, you know, everything's getting chopped up. Little pieces of land, people's putting houses everywhere. We have all these people out here now, and to me, they're not, not the people that's supposed to be out here. And I know that's not very accepting of myself, but I, I enjoyed it when there wasn't much traffic on the road. And other day I was talking to someone and I'm like, well, they moved out here. And they're like, yeah, they moved out here like 30 years ago.
Okay. Well, so yeah, I, I get that being still kind of new to the area. Yeah. Having lived there a few decades,
Well, kind of opposite. We lost people around the area, actually.
Yeah. So how far are you, you've mentioned earlier, how far are you from a big city?
So to the outskirts of Saskatoon, we're about 40 minutes. Yeah.
okay. So not bad. And how big is,
a couple hundred thousand I think.
a couple hundred thousand. So
I think so, yeah. Good. Or more, maybe that's a while back. I don't keep track of that sort of thing. It's more people than I want to deal with, so,
yeah. Yeah. So you got moved out there. Did you take your sheep with you? You get back into cattle?
Okay. Yeah, we, we moved over, I brought, uh, at that time I think I had about 150, 170 s uh, working full time. We bought in about 75 yearlings. Then, uh, had the horses, uh, was, was here a a a couple years and then BSE blew up. Um, things, uh, got pretty tight for, for a couple of years, but, uh, I kind of hung onto them, them cattle, 'cause we couldn't get rid of them. They weren't worth anything and you couldn't take 'em anywhere. Right? So, uh, they were, they were heifers.
I had bought all heifers, so we threw a bull in with them and, and, uh, went through that route. Then it got dry on us. The, the year after droughted out a bit and. I guess I, I was looking for, I I, I stumbled into a deal there with some feed and I, I should touch on that 'cause it was something that really helped us through the, the sheep kind of made payments on the cattle for the BSE because the sheep were paid for at the time and they were actually bringing a little better money. But
Court.
with the droughts, uh, there was no feed around to speak of. And, uh, I had a guy tell me that a neighbor of mine, uh, had a field of wheat that, uh, was crop insurance had rode off. Uh, they figured there was about a six or seven bushel crop in there. And I went to see 'em and we looked at the field, the kosher weed had come up in it, and it, because we had a late.
Uh, rain, and it was in September where we started to silo this, uh, the, the kosher wheat had flushed up and it was probably four or five feet high. Like we,
Oh yes.
I got a chopper in is what I did. I, I knew a guy with a chopper and trucks and stuff, and we, he rolled in and it was, I don't know, probably a seven mile haul, six seven mile haul over. And we just put, put it on top of the ground and tarped it. Right. And I had an all kinds of feed and I had all kinds of neighbor coming by because it was kind of something unique to the area that as usual, I get coffee shop going and I don't mind that.
But anyway, I custom fed some cattle and I custom fed some sheep as well. So we were running, I think I was about 150 head came in, uh, altogether of cattle that I was feeding, and I got another. A bunch of sheep, a liner load of sheep. I think we were close to 500 head of sheep at that time, feeding for the winter.
And, uh, I didn't have much cash flow, uh, but I had an old John Deere manure spreader here, so I took the beater off it and we filled that up and every day and I'd just take it out and drop it off, make two or three trips and just let it tumble out of the back of the, and that's how we fed. And that led into, uh, uh, some other silage that I found in Outlook.
There was a mint plant there, and they had all this old refuse from that, so they insiled it and they said, I started buying that by the truckload in the wintertime, and we fed it the same way. But the only claim I could do there was say that it was already my lambs were already flavored with mint. Right. Like,
Oh yeah. Yeah. Saved you a step there for the chefs.
Yeah. Yeah. And in that time, I guess I was selling all natural lamb to a, a, a lady that was targeting a certain market in restaurants. Anyway, it ended up, um, I got some lamb into a hotel where the queen was staying. Queen England was over and she ate my lamb, so then I could mark it. Lamb fit for a queen.
oh yes. Yeah.
Kinda
Now many of us have that opportunity.
Yeah. I guess we won't anymore,
No, Now, when you brought those sheep in, what size are you bringing those in, and what size are you selling? Are they wool breeds?
I was running wool, wool breeds and the, and that winter that, uh, the guy sent me was wool breeds as well. So we sheared all them as well that year here. But, uh, um, uh, sheep with wool on their legs is always what I tried to get, uh, wintered a lot better for me type of thing. They out in the cold and, yeah, that was, I forget the name of the book now that I read More Grass, more Sheep, more Money, or some darn thing like that.
Oh yeah. You know, we don't have too much wool sheep here anymore. It's all gone to Hare sheep do. Is there still, Uh, market for wool sheep in Canada, or is it gone kind of like the US market
it's gone like that across the world, I guess. Cal, that's the big thing.
to someone I think in Australia and they were talking about it as well, so, yeah.
Right. So I guess, uh, I was a director for the Canadian Cooperative Wool Growers for 14 years too. I, I guess full disclosure on that, so I kind of understood that wool market a little better. Um, Canada's wool isn't the greatest to begin with. Uh, I asked, I asked the manager years ago where we sat, I said, would we be in the top 10 of quality wool in the world? And he said, not even. But everybody thinks they have good wool, but really we don't have good wool when it comes right down to it.
Uh.
So where is Go? Good Wool.
Well, I guess the states has the finer wool, right? We had finer wool. This, This, country was kinda, the southern part of Saskatchewan was fine. Wool sheep down there, that's what got the ranches going in the early years, of course, just like other places. And, uh, it's left now. So, uh, I guess the production of going into sheds, that sort of thing has kind of dropped that wool quality off quite a bit. Um, so it's, it's kind of tough to deal with now. Tough to market.
Oh yes. Yeah. Something you just gotta deal with now. Now, how long did you do sheep cattle? Because you're not doing sheep now. You're, You're, just doing yearling cattle.
Now I got goats too.
Oh, you got some goats too? I thought you had goats.
Yeah, We run into, uh, goats. Probably trying to think now if it's about 13, 14 years ago, maybe Cal, about the time I switched my job in from being the, uh, irrigation irrigated forage foreman for the government. Uh, started a bit of a small project with, uh, invasive weeds at one of the pastures that we, the government owned at that time. It had, uh, I think it was something like 12,000, 10 to 12,000 acres infested, spurge on 25,000 acre, um, I don't know what you'd call it.
We call it a pasture, but, so they, I was got talking with it with, with a fallah that. He, he's actually kind of a friend and, and I had to work for him. And he's, he's a really good friend and still is a friend, and, uh, has been a mentor of mine over the years. And, uh, is on our, our other group, the, the Long Lifelong Learners Group. But, uh, he asked me if I'd be interested in doing something with grazing in there.
They had sheep coming in there, uh, they just weren't getting enough numbers right? Like they'd have anywheres from as low as 600 up to 1200 sheep in there. But, uh, we needed more impact, so he asked me to kind of take that over. So the first year, I, I did and we had 1100 of our own, and then he had, or pardon me, 800 of our own on our side. And then the other people had, uh, 1100 that had been doing it. So, you know, we had a good shot in there. And then the next year we, as the.
The government took it over entirely. Uh, that year, I think we were around 3,200 sheep and goats run in there. Um, and then, uh, yeah, that, that's when I kind of started buying my own goats. Government bought goats, believe it or not, the federal government had goats there and, uh, we were kidding goats out on that leafy spurge. Um, I thought it was something we could do and, and, uh, I, and we did do it. Yeah. And it worked out pretty good actually.
On, on the, the goats there, did you just have 'em in, did you just have 'em on that pasture or did you do any rotation or any management of those?
Yeah, they were moving now. Um, they were shepherding them previously, but the idea was that we were gonna fence these. Large fields they had. Um, because the idea was we could teach people to fence and manage things and just go out and check them rather than having to shepherd them all the time. Um, as it turned out, uh, the fencing plan was there, a bunch of material bought. Um, the guy that started fencing ended up not fencing.
He quit the job and, uh, we went back to kind of herding and, and kind of fencing for the summer. And then the next year they, I think they kind of, the, that, that year after I was done, done, I retired. So they had about 4,000 head that next year and they were shepherding them. So it's kind of a tough deal. I. But if they could have got all those big fields fenced, it would've been a lot better. It really would.
Oh yeah.
Yeah,
Yeah. And so that was about the time you started with goats?
I did, yeah. When they asked me to find goats, I would been kind of interested in anyway, so, um, I retired and I started up my own targeted grazing business and, and had sheep and goats here with the cattle. Had had some diversity going, I guess, and, the, the sheep do well on, on what we were doing. But I was targeting spurge mostly on a lot, a lot of my work was targeting spurge. I was very interested in leafy spurge and, the sheep kind of just didn't fit as well.
Running both breeds in numbers, so, uh, or. I don't know what the heck the most, I, I had, I suppose would've been around 250 goats at one time, but, and I was getting other people's goats and run into another project in the further southwest, and it was a 4,000 acre project, I guess I was on there and on there for three, four years type of thing, and got it under control.
Talked that rancher into investing in goats there so that, you know, hopefully they would be able to look after it themselves. Right. Was the idea. yeah. Yeah. Not all ranchers can hire somebody to come in and target graze on their land. It's costly. Yeah.
Oh yeah. Yeah. So doing that targeting grazing, they would hire you. You would come in. Um, graze your goats for a while till it got the leafy spurge under control, and then it's back to them.
Well, that 4,000 acres I didn't get across at all, that's for sure. Uh, we, I was down there a hundred days, 120 days, 130 days type of thing. Um, the first year I got home once overnight, I had a bull get into a dugout and I had to come rescue it and get it out and get back. But it's, uh, it's kind of a five hour drive to get back and forth. So, uh, things ran pretty good at home.
I, I got, uh, I really, a really good wife that was really supportive of what I wanted to do and backed me up and, um, the grandkids stepped in at an early age and helped and I've been very fortunate to be able to. Do something that I'm passionate about with the, with the grazing thing. I graze horseback and use border collies and guard dogs.
And you mentioned that earlier, you, are you still training dogs?
uh, just my own, I, I was custom training for a while and I was trialing for a while, but, uh, it's, it's easy to train dogs. Not good, not so easy to train them people. And, uh,
Oh, yes. Yeah,
trialing thing I found to be too political, so I stepped away from it too. It's kind like team rope and I used to team rope, but that's another disease, right? Those are just diseases. Enjoyable one. So.
Right. Yeah. I, I consider at times getting a border Collie, and then, well, then I wise up and realize I don't have the time to dedicate to a border Collie. And so I haven't done it. And then, then I, I worry about stress to animals, but really the big thing is having enough time to work with it. And I've not trained a dog, so it would be the blind leading the blind unless I buy a trained dog, and that costs a lot more money.
Yeah.
as of this point, I don't have one, but every once in a while I start looking for one and my wife's like, you looking at puppies?
Yeah. I, I have some of them ideas too, and sometimes if I lie down, that thought goes away.
Yeah. Yeah. I, I really don't think I need it, and it is just something else to add to what I'm doing, so that's what I keep telling myself. But I do know, every once in a while I slip up and I get really close. I,
I like using the dogs. I use 'em on the cattle and the goats, so they're pretty handy tool at times. Uh, I run, when I'm out grazing, I usually have three dogs with me, so two horses, trade off horses, but the dogs usually go out every day with me.
I've, I've never had the luxury of a good dog. We've, I mean, we've had good dogs, but not well-trained dogs. That would be the better wording. So. Interesting. Yeah.
days I just get them handy enough for to get by. I don't need, nothing's real special I guess.
Oh yeah. Yeah. Well, as long as they work for you, that's, that's your goals there.
Yeah, if they'll go out that, you know, five, 600 yards when I need them too, outta sight and, and think on their own and bring the stock back over to where I need them on their own, uh, that's what I need. I don't need a push button dog. I just need a thinking dog. And with some guidance from me, uh, sometimes I get in the way and sometimes I don't.
Yeah. So we all struggle with getting in our own way too often. Now with your, your goats, just a little bit more on that. What breed were you looking for? Or did you have a specific type in mind, or were you just buying what was available?
I, uh, was looking for Spanish genetics. I wanted to get something Spanish or Kiko, right, is what I was looking for. And I found Spanish first. And, uh. I bought a small trip group of goats. It's called a trip. Right. And it's a, it's a real trip. All right. Getting into them. But
Yeah. Yeah.
we, we grew 'em up good. And, uh, I, I closed herd, uh, I don't know what it is now, five, six years ago, I suppose, closed up. And we only use our own butts and that sort of thing. Uh, I, I, I was commenting the other day with, with a friend of mine and does targeted grazing, and I asked, I guess it was maybe on one of our, one of our, uh, gatherings there, we were discussing that, I guess when Dr. Ann was talking. And, uh, I, I made the comment that my goats have changed.
How, how they look, what, you know, different things about them. They've changed and adapted two things. Our climate for one, has to, they have to adapt better into, to, uh, being. With our extreme cold snaps and, um, making, utilizing feed better. I, I'm big on that, uh, looking for that, but also the way they browse and, and eat, they, they've changed, like mouth size is a little more important to me. And rumens, the way I graze is a little different than most.
I, I graze in the morning for a few hours and graze in the evening for a few hours and they tamp up pretty hard. They, you know, their rumens are quite swelled when they come in and, uh, let them relax for the afternoon. We go out for the evening and, and they fill up again and they get on that routine and I, I like to line them out in a line.
Would you say they're predominantly Spanish with some Kiko influence now, or have you brought in enough Kiko? You would say it's equal influence?
I, I've stayed more Spanish, I'll be honest. Yeah. I think there might have been some Kiko influence in what they called was Spanish, but, uh, it every, I brought in goats from Montana, bucks from Montana, and I brought, I bought a buck that we brought in from Texas, uh, span all Spanish. So, mostly dominant in Spanish, I'd say. Yeah. But, uh, very bipedal. Uh, if I get into some woodwork where I need them to be up in the air, boy, they'll stretch out a lot more than other goats.
Oh yeah. How are you fencing them? Are you shepherding in them or are you putting up some fencing?
Uh, at home I have fencing. I have a couple of strands on barbed wire, experimented with, and don't ever do that. They just tangle up with the barbed wire.
Oh yeah.
have a, an offset I use quite a bit and I've shared that with others and, um, they've used it and it's been pretty workable. I, one strand offset, uh, 10 inches off the post, 10 inches off the ground and got some rickety old fence that's holding goats in for the most part. Occasionally I do have something get out, but uh, you know, there's usually a reason for it, I guess.
Oh Yeah.
But, uh, fencing, fencing is pretty important for people getting in. I guess that's the thing I always, first comment I'll make is if they can't hold water, don't buy 'em. But, after you get 'em trained to electricity, they stay in actually really good. Like we kitted, uh, started kitten last year. Uh, rotational grazing and kidding we'll put up two. I started out with three strands, um, the first paddock.
Uh, and then I went to two strands and we started rotating and just bumping our does ahead and dropping the, the mothers and the kids behind and letting them catch up in a couple of days. Right. I, my back fence, I don't move as fast, but I'll move my front fence. Yeah. And we used to do that with sheep too.
well, I really like that idea, and that's similar to what we've done. At times with sheep. Uh, my journey with sheep, we've had sheep was this 20, 24, so almost 10 years now, and I'm still figuring them out. Lambing time is a little difficult for us in that I wanna tag those babies, but I don't wanna break up that bonding time. And I found last year I broke up some bonding time and ended up having more orphan lambs. I blame on myself, um, than I should have.
The year before I did what you were talking about, I, I just moved the herd forward and let those ewes stay back, and then I just moved them up slowly. It seemed to work much better, and that's what I'm, I'm planning for this year with my goats and sheep. However, I still don't have the ear tagging solved because I really, I don't know. I struggle. I didn't tag at all. Let's see. I'm trying to think. Last year I didn't tag at all.
I've tagged all the way up till last year and I thought I could match 'em up a little bit better, but I couldn't match 'em up to the ewes later on. I really wanted to, because we have a closed flock with our sheep and we just keep our own rams and, and it makes it tougher to pick out the rams I wanna keep for the following year if they're not tagged.
Yeah. Uh, we used to do that, uh, wh when I was pasture lambing, uh, had, uh, one dog in particular that was very good, that she would keep the mother fairly close to us while I snuck in and got the kids.
Oh
we put, we'd put a rotor tag in the kids. Um, if it went in the right ear, it was a female. If it went in the left ear, it was a male. So when they were coming down the race, I could draft them off easier. Uh,
Yeah, that's a good idea.
also painted numbers on some, at times with a spray bomb. Just use that. Uh, livestock paint. Uh, sometimes wrote a number on there if things got away in a hurry. Uh, used to keep track of everything. Uh, started building that, you know, anything that didn't have a baby went down the road. And after that, uh, anything that singled went down the road and had, I had a pretty good flock of ewes that were running really good for me, actually. And one day, two fools met.
Someone offered me too much money and I, uh, took it. So,
I don't blame you.
so a lot of them left at that point.
Yeah. And that's, that's actually kind of where we were, are we've been selling, uh, anything that doesn't lamb and, and, we'll, we'll continue to do that, but we're about to take a hard swipe at those ewes that just raised singles. Um, we, we feel like we have enough numbers and we really want to be able to identify those ewes and if there's any problem there, two strikes, she's out for sure.
So I, I started to try and do that with the goats, but they're a lot more touchier it seems. Um, so I, I don't, and I found I wasn't keeping track of the records anyway, Cal. So I quit worrying about it.
Uh
So we put it. We put a dangle tag on any of the, uh, doeling that we're keeping. So all the does and doelings are, are tagged with a dangle tag. And if I have a problem with something, it gets an ear notch on the tag. Not on the ear, but on the tag. if it gets, yeah, so if it gets two in the tag, it's gone. For sure. The first one, uh, if it's, uh, on the side of the tag, it's a warning. And it might be something that maybe it wasn't her fault.
If it's at the bottom of the tag, uh, like she's just Miss Mothered and was a bad mom, it'll be at the bottom of the tag and that goes, it doesn't get a second notch. Right.
Oh yeah. You just notching that with pliers or pocket knife.
Ear notch players. Yeah.
notches. Yeah. We, um, I always forget about those. We used to ear notch our dairy calves, and I always forget about those pliers, Dr. Sparks, who was big into kikos here in Oklahoma when I got my kikos. In fact, my first Kikos. Came from him and he was big on, goats are different than sheep. You can't expect goats to have twins every year. If you have a single this year, they're probably gonna have twins next year.
Now he, he always said he wanted a single to first year twins that every year after that. But he says goats, you have to be careful about pushing them to get there. Now, on episode, um, 67, we had Adam Levia on and he was talking about goats and he's really got his kidding percentage up high, um, over 200% and he's really focused on that. And I, which I thought was really impressive because I've never had that kind of of luck with my kidding percentage.
I, I guess I used to worry about that. Uh, with what I'm doing, I'm, I'm ranching 'em more than farming 'em, so I'm pushing them harder. Uh, I'm, I'm kidding late in the year, like, uh, may, June type of thing now. And I just, uh, not as worried about getting a lot of triplets or quads. I used to, you know, twins are, are great. I was getting quads at times, so I just started backing things off. Uh, don't flush as hard when I flush. Uh, it's just better pasture now.
Uh, we don't feed grain unless we have to. Uh, I have fed grain. I won't say I don't. Uh, I fed straw one year with, with grain screenings. It was wheat, uh, tech was in it. Wheat, lentils and peas were in it, uh, screenings. So, uh, and that was the cheapest way I could feed that year. Uh, I'm all about that. I feed weed bales. I get as much weedy bales as I can find cheap, as long as there's some grain in the weeds. Why? It works out pretty good. Yep.
And that, and that brings me to a question that I had, um, thought to ask earlier, and I hadn't asked. The land in your area, is there much farming going on or is it mainly pasture? You have a lot of irrigation.
Uh, there's a little bit of irrigation over here. Outlook was full of irrigation. Uh. When, where I was before I grew up on irrigation. Uh, over here, uh, to the north of me is, is all pasture. Very fortunate to the north of me, to the south of me, uh, is grain farming mostly. Yeah. So I'm on that edge there. Yeah.
Oh yeah, one more thing before we go to the overgrazing section. Do you wanna talk about your, um, lifelong learner group?
Uh, yeah, I can, thanks for bringing that up. I guess Cal, it's a, it's a thing, a little project I started it off with last year. Um, I was, uh. Became a mentor for the Canadian, uh, forage and Grazing Association and hosted, uh, meetings, uh, I guess it'd be a year ago now if that, we kind of finished that up. And, uh, I took the producers on those sites, uh, offered them, uh, soil Health program last fall and Outlook, uh, had people's gather in there.
And from that, I took those names and added into the poll and pool. I mean, and, uh, I started a, a kind of a newsletter thing, uh, with the option of, every second week or so we'll invite a speaker in to speak and, uh, talk about things. Uh, farm Ranch related mostly most of the time. And, uh. It's, it's, it's something that I think we can share and it's growing. Um, I think I'm up to, I don't know, 160 some people I'm sending mail out to right now.
And it's mostly been word of mouth and a little bit advertised on, on uh, Facebook a little bit. But, uh, it's, it's been very encouraging. And, uh, I guess the last one, uh, was, was last night and we discussed it was an open mic forum and uh, I think we're gonna start recording them too. People have been asking what we do and, uh, so I think we're gonna start recording everything. I was recording just the speakers. Unfortunately I had a really good podcaster on and I forgot to hit record.
Uh, w which was
may have been a good thing.
Grazing Grass Podcast. Uh, Cal Hardage was on. And, uh, we really enjoyed Gal and I appreciate you coming on.
thank you.
Um.
Well. I, I love the idea of your group and the email and having that opportunity for conversation. Um, I plan to be at, at some of the others, and I've not, not made it. I, I'm on blame. Sometimes I'm lazy. Sometimes I get busy, but, um, I'm gonna try and be there. 'cause I really like the idea of that, that shared community, um, discussing what's going on and having, having people in there talk. I, I just love the whole idea of it. And I, I am, um, impressed you have that going and glad you do.
Well, thank you. It's, uh, it's, it's a great learning curve for me, uh, doing it. But, uh, being able to share knowledge is something I've, uh. I've done a fair amount of, and I believe it's important to do, and I try to give back by stepping into some of these groups, uh, as directors and stuff that I've been involved with over the years because I'm giving back now, and I think that's important and, uh, helping out the youth. Um, I really want to try and get more youth involved.
Yes. Yeah. Great. I, I, um, really encourage anybody who wants to join that to join. And if someone wanted to, Lee, how would they join that?
They could just email me,
we, we can put more information in our show notes so that, um, someone can get on that so they can, can join in.
You bet. I appreciate that. Yep.
And Lee, it's time for us to move on to the overgrazing section where we take a little bit deeper dive into something you're doing, and you've mentioned it a few times, and that's targeted grazing. What, what do you even mean when you say targeted grazing?
So, uh, I'm using small ruminants, uh, now mostly goats because, uh, I deal with a lot of ranchers and they are very accepting of the goats being on their land because they feel they don't eat much grass and they really don't, if they're properly utilized, uh, they'll eat brush, they'll eat weeds, that sort of thing. More browse and Forbes. So, uh, what I do is noxious, we control a lot of that, uh, take the animals in and we, we try to graze them.
Um. Uh, uh, on the Spurs I'm getting to where I'm probably hitting it, like 40% of the plant is gone and it restarts the plant and we come back. I'm hitting it more often rather than, at first we were just trying to strip everything off of the plant to make it start again. I wasn't getting as much fast regrowth 'cause they were slower starting to come in for a second pass. So I, I kind of related to a poor farmer with cattle.
Their cattle are in there all the time grazing and I try to mimic that as we're coming and going across the i'll, I'll let them, uh, usually go out to the far end of the property where I am and will graze back in towards camp and, um, they'll just keep kind of touching it and shortening the roots. Right.
Oh yeah.
The idea is to make it. Kind of hurt a little bit and want to start more and more. Um, I, I chased my mind a little bit over the years doing it, how I do it now, and I think it's been pretty successful. I, I see results. Uh, the people that were in there monitoring said there was results and, uh, I like to have someone else monitor my work so that I am, I'm not biased. I do my own monitoring for my own satisfaction. But, uh,
Oh yeah.
yeah, so we usually, usually graze. I, you can fence a lot of people fence. You'll see that in, in a lot of, uh, urban areas where they'll fence and, and just have them in there all the time looking after them. Uh, whereas I choose to be in bigger spaces where I can herd with my dogs and horse, uh, horseback.
So, you, you're going out there horseback with your dogs and, um, shepherding those animals basically?
yes. Yes. That's, uh, and what I, I do it a little different than others because of, uh, the, the way I line 'em out. I, I'll do a horizontal or vertical on hillsides, or I try to get 'em side by side so that they're competing with each other, like people do at a buffet or smorgasbord. Hey, the first one's in, always keep their plates up. And, um, the first one's in, you know, I, if I can line 'em out and they're eating side by side, they eat hard.
So when I teach, uh, I try to, to teach people how to do targeted grazing. And, uh, I went to school down in the States, to couple schools to learn to do it properly. If with some great mentors, uh, uh. I went to, uh, Tennessee Browsing Academy, and then I went to the California Multi-Species Grazing Academy. Uh, then I brought those folks up and done one in Outlook, or not Outlook at Hanley here. Then we, uh, done another one in Swift KI guess in the winter time.
It was a winter deal, but yeah, just trying to educate people on it, if I can.
Oh yeah. And how long are you spending on these properties when you do this?
Well, the bigger ones on there quite a while, that like a hundred, 120 days minimum type of thing is, is is the season, uh, you know, from the time it starts until it's kind of done. Uh, the smaller ones you might only like some of these ones where you fence. You might be there a couple of days and you're moving, right, or a week or whatever. Those fencing projects we use, uh, mostly netting on them because of the public around. But, uh, I do get away with Multi Strand some places too.
Yeah. It just kind of depends on the area you're in.
It does. Yep, yep,
Yeah.
One. One of the things on this overgrazing thing, if I could set back the unwanted vegetation so that the wanted vegetation can get a better start and improve, so soil biology, then that's what we're about.
Oh yes. And is that just that leafy uh, spurge. Is that the main plant you're targeting there? Or do you all have a few other noxious weeds that's
Yeah, we have other noxious, we have other ones. Uh, there's some, uh, right now there's some grazing available that there was out for bid and I didn't really bid on it because they're bidding on, uh, spurge and they're bidding on, a grass species and absence is another one, and it's a more woody, small woody, plant. Wormwood, I think is also a name for it. But anyway, uh, they're targeting like three and four different plants. And to me it's.
The targeting of the plant on some of those plants is different. So you're trying to target 'em in one time, but you can't, you can't do it effectively. In my mind, that's my opinion on it. Um, so yeah, I, I settle on spurge. We got lots of it. It's uh, very high in, in protein, higher than alfalfa. Even in the late stages it's still very good. So my animals do really good and that's why, you know, I can have like that rancher.
He can, he can kid on it and do his kids will do real is those will do well. And yeah, they come out eating spurs, I'll tell you there.
Oh, very good. Yeah. Well, thank you Lee. Lee, it's time for us to move to our famous four questions, same four questions we ask of all of our guests. Our first question, what is your favorite grazing grass related book or resource?
Boy, you know, there's so many good things. I, I guess I have a deal. I, I'd have to say my, my computer type of thing is, is gonna be probably one of my better resources because, uh, every morning I take half an hour to an hour cal. I'll be honest, if I have my coffee and I'll, I'll watch or listen to things. Right. That, uh, educational things, you know, and that's, that's where I've been learning a lot of stuff, I guess. And when I'm out working, I'm on podcasts with my earphones in, so,
Oh yes. Yeah, very good. I, I do that at times. Now. I get sidetracked. The computer's really distracting. With all the tabs I can open and I can really go on a rabbit hunt. Now
I hooked mine up to the tv.
oh, oh, there you go. On the podcast and working outside. Sometimes I found I just gotta take my headphones out and just enjoy the moment. But then, um, I do that for a while and then I put my headphones back on because I want to, I want to enjoy the moment. I want to take it in, but then I also have this other need I wanna be learning.
yeah. Uh, listening to books while I'm out grazing a lot where I was this last time, uh, wasn't much internet, so downloading a book or a podcast was easy to do, so,
Worked out much better. Yeah.
yeah. You can't, like you say though, you don't do it full time.
yeah. You gotta take a little bit of break from that. Yeah. Our second question, what is your favorite tool to use on the Farmer Ranch?
Oh man, I thought about that. Yeah, I'd say, uh, anything that makes my life easy is a great tool for me. Uh, I, the little things, I guess, uh, like my leatherman, I, I use it a lot. Uh, that remote control, shutoff for that fencer is huge for me when we're moving cattle and stuff. Uh, and I use a quad a lot. I do when I'm at home here, moving fence. So we do a lot of poly fencing, temporary wire that we're moving, and I'm always either unrolling with the quad or reeling it up with a drill. So
Very good. Our third question, what would you tell someone? Just getting started?
be prepared. Uh, read as much as you can, shadow somebody that you think is doing a good job for you. Uh, take courses. Uh, a life changing thing for me has been taking, uh, ranching for Profit and I took my grandkids to a holistic management, uh, deal. Uh, both very good things, uh, to to look into. Yeah. And I, I, I wished I'd have done it to begin with. I really do.
Talking about going to Ranching for Profit, and I haven't gone yet. Uh, it's mainly that sticker price, sticker shock.
Yeah.
at that price, I'm like, oh, man. But, um, I, I have more free time now, um, because I'm on the farm full, full-time now. Um, with my other hobbies, I, I have resigned at my job so I can focus on the farm with the goal of, of doing this long term. I thought the timing was right, so I actually have more time available now.
Uh, yeah, it's only my opinion and other people have said it and I'd have to agree that probably you'll pay for that Ranching for Profit in the first year if you're serious and, and really, you know, dig into it. I think you will.
I've, I've only heard good things.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm going up to visit the boys, uh, Dave Pratt and, and Dallas Mount both, uh, gonna be together at one time in Saskatoon this week. They're teaching, uh,
Oh,
our Canadian laws don't allow them to be up here for the full length each, so they have to split the, the course in half and one teaches one half and one teaches the other half. And, I get, I'm gonna go up and visit, I guess Thursday night. I'll be doing that.
Oh, very good. And lastly, Lee, where can others find out more about you?
Facebook, I guess. Uh, I don't do a whole lot, I'll be honest. Uh, I'm on Facebook just for the sites that I enjoy looking at. I'm not there being a lovey-dovey, uh, contact person and wishing everybody well type of thing. Uh, Instagram's the other one I use. And, uh, x formerly Twitter, I have an account on them,
Lee, I appreciate you coming on and, and sharing about what you're doing and your journey. I've really enjoyed it.
Uh, thanks for having me on. I hope, uh, there's something worthwhile there for you to use and, uh, uh, anybody wants to reach out. I'm very open to anybody wanting to reach out. If I can help you, I sure will help out. If I can't, I may not know a lot, but I'll share what I have.