Strip grazing for pasture improvement and soil health.

It is very green but not what you would call particularly lush. The weather has been a bit dry of late, so the pasture is dry, not a lot of moisture content in it. Also the pasture is starting to mature so is drying off. It does have a higher ME than the lush pastures that we have on the coastal property, they are just high in water content.

We have a lot of Yellow Box for shade, and the cows have an electric laneway back to their water troughs and shade. If they feel the need for a drink or a siesta, they just wander back and lounge around under the trees chewing their cud.
regards Louise

No. Have they gone? I can still see them here. Funny things are happening. I don't have the normal "Reply" button that has the tool bar along the top, so can no longer post a photo or have "smilies" or the "quick reply" button. Also I only have an "Add Attachment" button. I am going to check my settings again

Hi squarey, we all up have 8 paddocks, but the three main grazing paddocks are on the creek flats. All of our external fences and some of the internal fences have a hot wire. We use a sacrifice night paddock which has gates opening onto the grazing paddocks. In this small paddock we have a machinery shed where we keep feed and a small hay shed, and we have a hot wire across in which we keep a large hay bale out in case we need to use it, but can lock the cows off otherwise. Each paddock is rectangle, with a permanent water troughs on the night paddock end, and trees on that end for shade.
We use hot wire reels that hook onto the fence on each side of the paddock, and we use tread-ins to hold the hot wires. We just use those connecting wires with the bulldog clips on each end to connect the temporary fence to the hot wire which runs along the permanent fence.
We use a wire in front of them as well as a back wire to keep them off the ground where they have already grazed. Mostly they do not have access to a strip for more than 2 days(actually only about 16 hrs.) and we organise it so that there is a laneway back to the shade and water as they move down the paddock.
Each morning we feed some pellets and sometimes some hay depending on the bloat risk stage of the pasture, then they go out to graze for the day, and then back in for a few more pellets at night, and depending on the stage of the pasture we may also give them some straw for roughage.
we prefer to supplementary feed them a little every day and budget our pasture to last year round, than having to heavily supplementary feed when there are feed shortages. We find that they do better this way and have even condition all year.
It is pretty labour intensive, but are so happy with the way our pastures have improved, and how we are able to reduce weed impacts without having to resort to spraying and chemical warfare LOL.
As to how to judge how wide a strip, that depends on the pasture, the rate of growth and how many cows. The trick is to never overgraze, don't let them eat it right to the ground, the plants struggle to regrow. They don't have any vegetation left for photosynthesis, and lose all of their energy reserves. Likewise don't let them have to much, because then they will select out the best and leave the rest We just judge it each day, they have to be able to finish what we give them in that 8 hr period, if they don't, then we cut back the next day on what we give them.
Also what they don't eat they will trample into the ground which is great. It leaves vegetable matter for the bacteria and fungi in the soil to live on which will improve the quality of the soil.
Sorry to have written on so much but there isn't a quick answer to how to strip graze. It doesn't have to be strip grazing as such, lots of little paddocks are just as good, but the cost of fencing would be prohibitive. We just find this a cheaper and easier way for us.
I can assure you that you won't regret it. It doesn't matter how large or how small your property and paddocks are, they all benefit from this method of grazing. It is just so sustainable for the land.