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N E Illinois | ISU in Iowa. I like it that a young person is thinking. I have about 100 cows on 39 acres. I rotate through the paddocks and drylot when pasture is short. I also sell hay.I raise about 100 acres of alfalfa. I feed very little hay.I sell the best and feed the rest. I bale cornstalks and soybean straw. I am a small operator farming less than a thousand acres. I am grazing all the cornstalks that I did not bale. I have a tmr and currently mix soy straw, soy hulls, and gluten into a balanaced ration for the momma cows. I have told people I remove the stalks , straw etc and return it "enhanced" as manure. I utilize more of the crop than my grain farmer friends do. I baled the wheat straw. I fed that for a time this summer till I got bean straw baled. Don't let some these naysayers discourage you. It can be done. Calve your cows and feed the calves out if you have enough facilities to do so. JC1206 has 75 cows on 12 acres. He does it successfully. I may think a litle differently than others. I don't grow RR soybeans. I raise conventional that fetcha sizable premuim. Be diversified. GO FORWARD WITH YOUR VISION!!!!!!!!!!! | |
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Building a cow herd in the middle of IA corn country
