There are many factors that contribute to achieving high performance targets from good grazing management. This includes balancing pasture quality with animal needs.
With deer, the key management principle to keep in mind is pasture height, as this offers the animal the opportunity to graze readily, but must be balanced with maintaining the quality of feed.
Feed budgeting is a useful tool to ensure that the feed supply on the farm will provide for the stocking rate and performance targets. Adding supplements like silage, crops or barley; or using other livestock to balance the forage system, can be critical to manage grazing efficiently.
An example of the theoretical liveweight gain profiles of young red deer stags on pastures of different quantity from the QGraze software.
