Multii- Species grazing plans

 

So on a farm one could have five similar lots of pasture. Monoculture farmers would put 4 cows in the first lot; 20 goats in the second lot, 6 donkeys in the third lot; 48 geese in the fourth lot; and 200 free range chickens in the fifth lot.  They could all eat down the lots in a given amount of time and need moved to five more lots.

It is my objective opinion that when pasturing 12 geese they eat roughly the same amount of grass as a cow. Most websites report 4-6 goats eat the same amount of grass as a cow. A Donkey's appetite is generally considered to be about 2/3 that of a cow. Approximately 50 chickens can consume a similar amount of vegetation in a day as the amount consumed by one cow.

So on a farm one could have five similar lots of pasture. Monoculture farmers would put 4 cows in the first lot;20 goats in the second lot, 6 donkeys in the third lot; 48 geese in the fourth lot; and 200 free range chickens in the fifth lot.  They could all eat down the lots in a given amount of time and need moved to five more lots.

The multispecies farming methods I subscribe to would handle the situation differently.

Still having five lots I would put the geese and goats in the first lot with 4 donkeys ,  cattle in the second lot with two more donkeys, and chickens in the third lot. Then after half as much time I would put the cattle where the goats and geese were, the goats and geese in a new lot, and the chickens where the cattle were. I would continue this rotation around all 10 total lots.

Why? Because goats eat brush, limited amounts of grass, and briers, donkeys eat weeds, broom-sage, and a small percent of grass, and geese eat weeds, amphibians, reptiles, and grass. They would go through and clear out the less desirable forage the cows would not consume. The donkeys would also keep predators away from the geese and goat kids. Any supplemental grain supplied to the donkeys and goats would be cleaned up entirely by the geese. When they moved on to the second lot the cattle would come in and mow down the remaining grass and trod the accumulated manure from themselves and the preceding group into the pasture.

    This second group would leave the pasture mowed very low and spread profusely with parasite and undigested grain laden manure. Upon the arrival of the chickens this nutrient rich waste would be picked over scratched out and any morsel of insect, worm, grub, or sprout would be snatched up and the pasture sanitized.

In my method of farming each species holds a niche.

Twice as often rotations followed by an additional 55% of recovery time for each pasture plus the elimination of parasites in every pasture without pesticides, antibiotics , or medicine, plus the eradication of brush and weeds in all pastures without application of herbicides or defoliants.