Sheepvention 2025: A lambing-ready grazing plan that protects both ewes and pasture

Article summary: Late winter is when feed pressure and wet soils collide. This playbook gives you a simple before, during, and post-lambing grazing rhythm, plus a weekly checklist (covers, rotation length, residuals, growth vs demand) so you protect ewe condition and avoid long-term pasture damage. It also shows how to use Pasture.io’s paddock-by-paddock covers and a quick feed wedge to decide where to graze next.

 

Sheepvention in Hamilton (Victoria) lands right in the late-winter pinch (3–4 August 2025). It’s the time of year when you can feel the spring lift coming, but you still have to get through wet soils, slow growth, and the pressure of setting your lambing mobs up well.

This is where a simple lambing rotations plan pays off. You can recover from a small feed deficit. You cannot easily recover from a hammered pasture base, especially if you pug and compact soils when they are saturated. Wet soils lose strength quickly, and treading damage can wreck soil structure and reduce pasture regrowth.

Below is a practical playbook you can use immediately.

The mindset: protect the pasture base first

When conditions are wet, the aim is not “perfect utilisation”. It’s:

  • Keep ewes settled and thriving

  • Preserve leaf and residuals so pasture rebounds

  • Avoid irreversible soil and pasture damage

If you do end up with significant pugging, it can cost you feed for a long time. DairyNZ summarises research showing seriously pugged pasture in spring can produce around 40% less dry matter through the following season. (Sheep or cattle, the pasture plant and soil response is still the same.)

Your lambing grazing rhythm: before, during, post

Before lambing: build a feed bank and simplify decisions

Your goals (typically 3–6 weeks out):

  • Build pasture cover where it matters

  • Identify lambing paddocks early

  • Set a rotation that protects soil and regrowth

1) Allocate feed to the mobs that must not slip

  • Put your multiple-bearing ewes first in the queue.

  • Prioritise paddocks that are:

    • Drier underfoot and less prone to damage

    • Close to water

    • Lower traffic risk (fewer gateways, less walking)

    • With shelter if you rely on it for lamb survival

2) Decide now: where will you “sacrifice” if it turns ugly?
If you wait until it’s pouring sideways, you’ll make rushed decisions. Pick a sacrifice area in advance:

  • A run-down paddock you can renovate later

  • A laneway + sacrifice corner

  • A feed pad or containment area (if you have it)

  • Stubble or a well-drained holding paddock

3) Set a simple pre-lambing rotation rule
Keep it practical:

  • Longer rotation as growth slows

  • Avoid re-grazing the same paddocks too soon

  • Keep residuals sensible so plants rebound quickly when spring arrives

4) Lock in “no-go” conditions
Make a rule you and your team can follow without debate:

  • If you’re leaving deep hoof marks or the surface is “plastic”, you’re doing damage

  • If stock are camping gateways and walking tracks, pressure is too concentrated

  • If you wouldn’t drive a bike or ute across it without cutting it up, think twice

During lambing: keep ewes settled, minimise disturbance

This is where the set stocking vs controlled shifting decision matters.

Option A: Set stocking (common for lambing mobs)

When it suits:

  • You want ewes settled

  • You’re managing labour

  • You’re prioritising lamb survival and mothering-up

How to do it without trashing pasture:

  • Set stock on paddocks you chose earlier (drier, sheltered, lower traffic)

  • Keep stocking pressure realistic, and be ready to move if conditions turn

  • Avoid forcing ewes to walk long distances for water or feed

Option B: Controlled shifts (for non-lambing mobs or tight situations)

When it suits:

  • You’re still rotationally grazing part of the farm

  • You need control of residuals and allocation

Rules that keep it simple:

  • Shift less often rather than more if labour is tight (eg daily or every 2 days)

  • Use bigger breaks to reduce time spent fencing

  • Back-fence if you can to reduce tracking and re-treading

Wet weather tactic: reduce time on pasture

A proven approach in wet conditions is “on-off” style grazing: let stock harvest intake, then get them off to limit treading and pugging. Agriculture Victoria describes on-off grazing as a way to reduce wet-soil damage by limiting time on paddock.

For sheep, the principle is the same. Your stand-off might be:

  • A sacrifice paddock

  • A laneway system with hay

  • A containment area

Post-lambing: reset the system for the spring lift

Once lambs are up and going, the goal is to move from “survive late winter” to “capture spring growth”.

Your goals (first 2–6 weeks after lambing starts):

  • Get back to a controlled rotation where possible

  • Lift utilisation without scalping

  • Repair any damage early

1) Start tightening the rotation carefully
As growth picks up, you can shorten the round, but keep residuals high enough to fuel regrowth.

2) Clean up behind lambing paddocks
Lambing paddocks often end up uneven. Decide what’s realistic:

  • Light tidy graze with a different class of stock (if available)

  • A quick “top” if you use it (and it’s practical)

  • Leave it if conditions are still wet and you’ll do more harm than good

3) Triage damaged paddocks
If you have pugging:

  • Light damage: often recovers with rest and warmer conditions

  • Moderate to severe: may need repair work or renovation planning
    The earlier you identify them, the easier it is to plan the fix.

Weekly checklist: what to measure (and why)

You do not need to measure everything. You need to measure the few things that drive good decisions.

Measure this weekly

  • Paddock covers (or pasture mass)

    • What you have now, paddock-by-paddock

  • Average farm cover

    • Are you building a bank or burning it down?

  • Rotation length

    • Are you going to run out of grass before spring?

  • Residuals

    • Are you leaving enough leaf to regrow quickly?

  • Growth vs demand

    • Is growth keeping up, or do you need supplement or containment?

  • Feed on hand (supplements)

    • How many days of buffer do you actually have?

  • Soil conditions and damage risk

    • Where is it too wet to graze without paying for it later?

If you’re only doing one thing, do paddock covers. Everything else becomes easier once you can see what you have.

The “don’t do irreversible damage” rules in wet conditions

Use these as decision triggers:

  • Don’t chase utilisation on saturated soils. Treading damage is cumulative and hard to undo.

  • Stand stock off sooner than you think. Short time grazing then off-paddock reduces pugging risk.

  • Concentrate damage where you’ve chosen to wear it. A deliberate sacrifice area beats accidental damage across your best paddocks.

  • Reduce walking and camping. Multiple gateways, closer water, and avoiding long narrow breaks can lower traffic damage.

How Pasture.io helps you make the next grazing decision fast

Late winter is not the time for guesswork. The win is being able to answer, quickly:

“Which paddock should I graze next, and what can it afford to lose?”

Step 1: Build a quick feed wedge

In Pasture.io, use your paddock-by-paddock covers to generate a feed wedge (a ranked view of pasture availability). This makes the trade-offs obvious:

  • What’s too low to touch

  • What’s ready now

  • What’s carrying your rotation

Step 2: Allocate with confidence

Once paddocks are ranked by cover, you can:

  • Identify your lambing paddocks and protect them from being overgrazed

  • Choose “next to graze” paddocks based on feed and soil risk, not habit

  • Keep a simple rotation length target in mind and adjust as growth changes

Step 3: Close the loop with residuals

After grazing, record what happened:

  • Did you hit the residual you intended?

  • Did the paddock cop damage due to conditions?
    That feedback makes the next week’s choices sharper.

A simple lambing rotations playbook you can copy

Before lambing

  • Pick lambing paddocks and a sacrifice area

  • Build covers where it matters

  • Set a rotation rule and a “no-go” wet-soil trigger

During lambing

  • Choose set stocking for lambing mobs (keep them settled)

  • Use controlled shifts only where it adds value and is low labour

  • Stand stock off in wet spells rather than wrecking your base

Post-lambing

  • Reset into a controllable rotation as growth lifts

  • Triage damaged paddocks early

  • Use the feed wedge weekly to stay ahead of demand

The takeaway

Sheepvention is full of good ideas, but the biggest profitability lever in late winter is still the same: a simple plan that keeps ewes performing and protects your pasture base.

If you measure a few key numbers weekly and use paddock-by-paddock covers to guide decisions, you’ll get through lambing with fewer surprises, and you’ll be ready to cash in on the spring lift.

- The Dedicated Team of Pasture.io, 2025-08-14
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