Cows out!

TMKF said:
It's a hard thing to gauge. Advisors differ a lot, some are more conservative.
I was certain last year I would have to either reseed or stitch the top of a field (cows damaged it at the back end of 2012). Ran the land leveler and chain harrowed it til I could get around to it. By the following rotation it wasnt worth doing it had recovered so well.

Rollers have a place in silage fields but I'd avoid them like a plague on a grazing paddock.
I'd go in on temporary pass ways when it get dry enough, a stretch of some good days ideally a touch of dusty. If ground is still muddy the harrow will back a god awful mess and a waste of time. If it was extremely poached (something I try my best at all times to avoid) then yea I'd either get the land leveler and a stitcher or harrow it then possibly broadcast and roll (cheaper but less effective and likely less persistence and more loss of seed).
My harrow is older than I am so I can't give any suggestions I'm afraid
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Did teagasc or someone else not do some trails last year on poached ground,as far as I can remember you could be back as much as 50% in grass yeild on there worst trial.
 
The most important thing with a poached paddock is make sure not to poach it a 2nd time as that is when it really knocks production for the rest of the year
 
Being on wet ground here, it has happened many a time. There are two different grades of poaching IMO.

If the ground is firm under foot and cattle are out on of a wet night and damage the grass so you see mostly clay from a distance, so long as they haven't sunk their hooves in to the clay, it looks worse than it is. Fertilise as normal and over the coming months it will recover. Dont roll.

Now if the cattle sink 3" in to the soil, that's a different game, and in my experience, you may ring [MENTION=3098]laoisfarmer[/MENTION] to try out his new plough. Rolling might be some help to put the sod back together, but it'll never recover to any great extent.

The lesson we've learned is that deep poaching is not an option and must be avoided at all cost, it'd be better to zero graze the grass in off the paddock and burn your own diesel than to get a contractor in a month later with a plough to burn his. You can try anything, I've done it myself, but a bad poaching can't be repaired.

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limerick man said:
You could back as much as 50% in grass yield if its poached bad enough.
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Ok yea. But as I said we void poaching at all costs. I'm talking about using a narrow on entrances and 2m strips of temporary passes that avoid poaching down the field as they cross it. The only other place that would require work might be one or two wet spots in otherwise dry fields

If a chain harrow fixes it like I'm talking about, then its not bad poaching.
 
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