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Report
T013 ***
Problem:
Ragwort infested pastures & grazed bank-sides
Where: Brownmoors Farm, Thixendale, North Yorkshire
When: March 2003
Status: Organic
Area: approx. 20.24 hectares (50 acres)
Detail: Visible small rosettes pulled as a demonstration.
28 man-hours
More-or-less permanent grazing from cattle & horses.
Advise using more handwork & only cull ewes for grazing
(see report)
This
site was being winter-grazed by Exmoor ponies, in an effort
to clear the long grass, and encourage wildflowers &
herbs. Unfortunately they also ate the sweet areas of grass
down to the soil, and caused a lot of disturbance with their
hooves, especially towards their water supply. There is
no doubt that continuous close grazing increases the success
of Ragwort.
A
workforce of four removed all visible rosettes from a section
of approximately 6 acres of heavily infested pasture land.
A small trailer was filled with seedling sized rosettes.
Later in the year a small trial was set up to keep animals
out of a 3m X 3m area that had been cleared of intensive
plants, to see if grass or the resident seed-bank won the
battle for survival. Unfortunately the fence was taken down,
but not before there was evidence that animal exclusion
was an important way forward, area by area.
Turf
has to be allowed to repair and become tough enough to support
lightweight animals.
Many
plants emerged after March, and although the workforce did
make some impact, 24 man-hours of work was not sufficient
to begin the real task of clearing the site. Later in the
year, the farmer used a forage harvester to collect as many
of the flowering plants as he could. Warning: he is almost
certain that the poisoned fumes generated by the mulching
process made him pretty ill, albeit temporally.
Our
recommendations to the farmer included:
- No
permanent grazing in winter. Restrict animal access.
- Cull
sheep would be better than cows or horses.
- Vary
the position of the water source.
- Allow
the turf to fully repair without any grazing over a trial
area
He
was uninclined to do too much, because he could remember
Ragwort growing on his farm since he was a boy. He remembers
some fields being almost entirely yellow.
Despite
grazing both cattle & horses all his life, he thinks
there is only one death (a cattle beast), which can be attributed
to Ragwort.
Cost:
£168.
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