Lloyd HM conference

[smcgrath76]

Finished up today and it was a pretty good
event. Nice to bend the mind a bit and
sit with youthful minded and positive
thinkers in primary agriculture.
PC - I tried looking for you. Were you
able to go?

[victoire]

SM Glad you enjoyed the HMI conf.Good turn out but still should have been more .

[smcgrath76]

It often seems those who have the most to
gain through change, are the least likely
to search for new answers.

[littledoggie]

Pardon my ignorance, but is that "holistic management"?

[smcgrath76]

ld - you are correct.

[littledoggie]

I wonder if you could educate me a little, I don't know much about HM. Years ago it was explained to me that one principle of HM was to NOT make your own hay. ?

[victoire]

HMI is agoal orrientated approach to managing land livestock people &finances in a manner which is envirmentally economically & socially sound .

[smcgrath76]

I would echo victoire's comments somewhat.
There are tools in HM to reduce/eliminate
the need to feed hay. That said, if you
like feeding hay (eg: you bought a team
and could think of nothing finer than
doing chores with them), then that is OK
to. It is about goal setting and
measuring deliverables in monetary,
social, personal and ecological framework.

[PureCountry]

We couldn't make it work. One of the more disappointing disappointments I can recall in recent history. lol

I inspected cattle every day last week, and we didn't have anyone to watch the kids either. Really wanted to be there when it was this close to home. Maybe next year.

[wd40]

An old late cow hand told me too that you could train cows to get along without hay. Cut em back 1/4 lb. per wk. and about the time their trained they'll die. LOL

[Ruken]

From my understanding, Holistic management is based on your own personal goals that include family, finances and ecosytem. They are yours and no one elses. From that you base your life and decisions including whether you make hay or buy it.(or anything else)
I've heard people walking around making statements that HM is something this or something that which simply is not true.
Each person, family or farm have their own goals and criteria to get where they are want to get. The key is that it is theirs, is personal and not dictated by neighbors, the coffee shop or a larger organization.

[littledoggie]

Thank you for the responses.
All I know is that it's nice to have enough feed for the winter and that it's secure. We have tried many different methods of feeding and between battling the wildlife and mother nature in general, the ONLY sure thing for us is hay in the fenced bale yard that we put up and hauled ourselves.

[grassfarmer]

Interesting to me as I'm half way through taking an HM course at the moment. I concur with Ruken and others that HM is not one thing, it's not a "system" you buy into that one size fits all.
I am finding that challenging our paradigms is quite liberating - as an example I've been so set on improving the pasture and land through grazing management using cow power alone that I just realised that I've wrongly overlooked the other tools available to me - like mechanical improvement IF that passes my testing process on the other criteria ie financial, social etc. This may be a way to address a weak link in my system and enhance the efficiency and profitability of my solar conversion activities.
I think anything that challenges our pre-conceived ideas of how we do things is a worthwhile exercise. It opens up whole new avenues of opportunities for us to consider.

[littledoggie]

Maybe some certain bureaucracies could benefit from this.