Well-managed pastures on livestock farms can provide high-quality habitat for grassland bird species that are declining in number, especially if areas within the pasture acreage […]

Compass Tools are designed to help growers improve on-farm decision making and financial farm planning. A new and improved Livestock Compass spreadsheet is now available for meat and egg producers on CIAS’s Compass Toolbox website.

Wisconsin is a national leader in organic agriculture. Wisconsin had 1,334 organic farms in 2015, nearly doubling over the last 10 years. This puts our state in a good position to participate in the growing market for organic food, both in the U.S. and across the globe.

Country Natural Beef started with 14 ranching families marketing 200 head of natural beef cattle in 1987. In recent years, the cooperative has nearly 100 member ranches in multiple states that raise more than 100,000 brood cows, manage more than 6 million acres of land and sell almost $50 million of products.

Begun in 2005 by Mike and Deb Hansen in central Wisconsin, Good Earth Farms
includes five operations that sell nearly all of their certified organic meat through the internet.

The Wisconsin Grazing Activities Resource List (2013) contains information on current managed grazing and pasture-related organizations, contacts and research initiatives.

Managed grazing is an effective option for beef producers in Wisconsin. This system, which dramatically increases yield and quality of pasture and focuses on reducing production costs, has potential to improve profitability of beef operations of all kinds.

Grass Clippings features grazing research from the University of Wisconsin and beyond. In this issue: Fertility and pastures, beef and dairy cattle gains on different pastures, beef cattle on pasture and supplements, and Gildersleeve accepts Extension grazing job.

Finishing beef animals on pasture can potentially reduce the overhead costs of facilities and equipment compared to confinement finishing. Researchers at UW-Madison set out to learn if beef animals finished on pasture can make the Select and Choice quality grades for conventional meat markets.

Do orchardgrass, fescue or legume/grass combinations produce more meat on growing, pastured beef animals? Do beef steers, beef heifers or dairy steers show the most gain on pastures? Researchers in the departments of Animal Sciences and Agronomy at UW-Madison recently finished a three-year study to answer these questions.