His Ma and Pa were off eating somewhere else on the farm and had left junior to take his nap. There were several spots around where the big guys had slept.

OK, so I can’t mow the paddock right now. It needs a mow – when the mowed grasses and weeds break down they’ll aid the regrowth of thicker grass.

I did get to pat the little guy. Just think, in twelve months he/she will be breaking my fences. That’s better than making a little stain on my flail mower.

At the top of the paddock it has received more sun, further matured and gone somewhat to seed.

But the cows don’t munch on the top of long grass like this. They dig into the sward. A bit under the seedheads is a lot of fine leafy stuff.

Way at the bottom you can’t see the old soil surface for the new worm casings. This is what people like Greg Judy mean when they talk about worms building soil. There’s a layer of worm casings that are all new this spring. Note that Sleepy Hollow is in the best shape of all the permanent pastures – the others aren’t at this level of wormvana yet.

And since the Agricultrix has taunted me with that awful Break My Stride song, I need to reply with something both grasspunk and boy. Here it is: The Offspring

A perfect song to sing when working with cows. You gotta keep ‘em separated.

We’re working on getting the quality of the rest of the grass to move closer to this, and also working on improving Sleepy Hollow itself. It’ll take a while.

There’s a wild pea that grows well there. I thought it was birdsfoot trefoil (lotier) but I have a ton of that elsewhere and this one has its leaves more elongated. It will be flowering soon and maybe I can identify the exact plant once I see the flowers and seeds.

The density of grass is much higher than last year. Having some rain helps. And we even have a few poppies near the farmhouses.

Within one paddock you’ll find areas that are very fertile and grow well and others that are just dead. If there is so much variation in one field where many conditions are nearly identical then the variations between farms, regions and countries can be just huge. This makes transferring ideas from one place to another a little difficult at times and it reinforces that it makes sense to listen to your neighbors.

If you want to learn about soils there’s a lot of interesting information out there. I’ve been reading material from Australia where they often have droughts. New Zealand do excellent work with pastures, but their winters are mild and most places get decent rain. The USA has done a huge amount of work which can apply here (although I am still trying to figure out which state or region has the most similar climate to ours).

Today I was checking out the agricultural part of the Soil and Health Library and reading Michael Astera doc on soils when I found this quote:

“The state of Kentucky is known for raising some of the finest horses in the world. The neighboring states, Tennessee and Indiana for instance, are not. Why? Because Kentucky soils are largely made from broken down limestone, high Calcium and probably high Phosphorus limestone, what strong bones are made of.”

Cool, I thought, we have similar soils and are known for raising cows with strong bones. Astera continues,

“The same goes for areas of France that have been raising strong, healthy cattle and horses since pre-Roman times – the rocks their soils are made of contain high amounts of Calcium phosphate.”

OK, he’s way ahead of me. The reading continues.

Legume wars! And I love seeing that plantain grow tall.

The old name for this breed was Gasconne muqueuses noires, which means with black mucus membranes e.g. black around the eyes and nose. They joined the breed with the Gasconne Auréolée from the Gers a few decades back to make the Gascon, but then they split the breeds back up again. Like our Salers, Gascons are mountain cows but from a different mountain range; these girls are from the Pyrenees at the France/Spanish border. 

This crew are using a cornadis, which seems to be the standard for newer farm buildings.

Back over a year ago I was looking at Gascons as a potential breed for us. They are rustic, hardy mountain cows that do well on grass and marble better than the standard Blonde or Limousine. Plus they are cute.

In all I visited six different farms with Gascon cows. Every one kept them inside for winter, even the couple of farms that were out of the mountains and down in the plains. I have seen Gascons outside in the cold Ariège in winter so they are keeping them inside for reasons of worker ease or production performance rather than any lack of tolerance in the cow breed.

This herd of heifers is in stabulation libre, where they can run around a small pen for the winter. Straw is thrown in to keed the bedding clean.

Although at the same farm the mother cows are chained for the winter. A lot of farmers like using the chains since they can get the cows accustomed to human closeness.

The calves get chained near their mothers and brought out to feed twice a day. This is also a system they use for veau sous la mère, the white veal, although they usually have a spare milk cow to provide extra milk for the growing lad.

A Gascon bull showing the fine condition of his rump. And yes, French farmers still use berets.

Gascon bulls can get very dark.

The bull below was at a different farm. The farmer was very proud of this bull and the Groupe Gascon guy thought he was special, too. Not being au fait with Gascons I can’t tell a bad one from a good one, but this bull is pretty well muscled with a long back but I’m a little wary about the arch in it.

There’s always one cow who wants to sniff the camera to see if it is made of lucerne.

This farm was in a mountain valley. Half way up the hillside was another village. It looks cold. 

And deep in the Pyrenees this farm has a Border Collie with mismatched eyes. This is a very successful dog breed.

When the houses down here have roofs made of slate, you know it snows a lot.

The heifers, like all teenagers, are sleeping in.

The mother cows yet to calve are enjoying a bit of a lie-in, too.

Otto went on a week-long school trip to the coast, a big deal when you are only seven years old. The teachers said this helps expand the kids’ horizons. They learn that there are places in the world without vineyards.

The tractor tires are so new you can still read the size on the tread. [Note US spelling of ‘tyres’.]

Cow 57 is known as ‘Old Cow’ although she’s not quite the oldest. She’s the new lead cow and is very good at her job, leading the herd to the new day’s strip of grass when I call.

The crop of lucerne doesn’t have many grasses in it, which is unusual for a first cut of such an old seeding. Maybe the February snows held back the annual grasses? Still there are plenty of nice dandelions to add to the mix.

There’s been progress on the new cattle yards. The posts are mostly in and concreted, now we wait a week for them to cure before putting the barriers up.

I finally figured out the little macro button on the camera so here’s a little grasshopper eating the lucerne. Hey man, don’t eat too much. That’s cow food.

The herd is in the Florida paddock. The grass here has had about three months rest over winter and is seeing some good early spring growth. Last year we grazed this paddock in May, this year in late March. The fertility is visibly higher with way more litter on the ground. Ryegrass seems to be doing well along with meadow fescue. 

Eric’s house is right by the herd. Below Blackie Onassis is trying some of Eric’s nice grass.

This close-up shows some of the the litter that is partly decomposed – the old dried grass from last year. As the worms eat this we’ll see the benefits later in Spring. There is also some vetch or sainfoin here. You get more legumes when you stop the practice of adding in artificial nitrogen fertilizer. Less nitrogen gives legumes a competitive advantage until there’s a balance met. This balance depends on your grazing management. We’ll see where it gets to but right now we’re seeing way more legumes than in 2011.

The last photo shows some of Sleepy Hollow. We hammered this area with the herd over winter. It was grazed twice with extra hay to supplement the grass. The herd left this area about six weeks ago and it had grown so well since then that we might graze it next.

Only some of the paddock is this fertile but all parts have seen a big gain since last year. As soil fertility increases we’ll see benefits everywhere – water retention, early growth, resistance to hoof impact, drought resistance…

One question that I always ponder is what will be the steady-state species mix of the pasture after a few years. Which grass will dominate? Which legume? Right now annual ryegrass seems to be doing well in the fertile areas. It isn’t clear what is doing well with the legumes and we are seeing red clover, some vetches, sainfoin and lotier/birdsfoot in greater quantity than 2011.