Quick Tip #23--Your Pasture Should Be At Least As Crabby As Your Third Grade Teacher

Horse Christmas just started out in the horse lot this morning. The crab grass is coming up and is mingling with the clover, rye, and other grasses and weeds. Nothing makes horses happier than a mouthful of crab grass.

Recent research has given proof that there are few things better for a horse than crab grass growing from nitrogen rich soil. (The clover in my pastures helps fix the nitrogen in the soil.) I will be planting much more crab grass in future years. It is perhaps the most resilient warm season grass that we have. Seed is hard to come by, but turning up and transplanting strong root and shoot systems seems to be an effective, though very labor intensive method of getting a stand going.

Crab grass dies off at the first frost. However, it seems to stockpile well if allowed to grow tall enough. Stock piling allows "dead" post frost grasses to be grazed as if they were alive. Though not as nutritious as living grass, stock piled forage is a nice, early winter feed for horses.

A more efficient use of smaller pastures is to allow the crab grass to be grazed down in late summer and then drill in rye or oats (in our part of the country). Doing so provides a bit of pasture over the winter and insures a solid early spring crop.

Add to this mixture safe tree bark and roots for winter and good quality hay and free access to 2/1 mineral and it is hard to imagine a better diet for a horse who is not insulin resistant.

(Insulin resistant horses should not be afforded green forage. The risk of laminitis is too high).