Hi there!
This is my first post on here, hope someone can give me a few pointers on my smallholding project and correct anything wrong i'm suggesting too! I'm a newbie to this!
I've found my way into having a smallholding of 12 acres and learning as I go how to deal with it all. Previous person who had the land didn't do too much (if anything) apart from run sheep on it. I've had sheep on the usable parts of the land for the past few summer months....now with the sheep coming off here is my chance to get doing some land management!. The land is all in adjoining fields slightly sloping towards a watercourse and can be described as follows:
- 10 acres - fairly poor quality grazing land with small patches of long reed grass all over. I've had sheep on here grazing it off over the past few months so it is fairly short now.
- 1 acre - long grass (3ft) full of buttercups
- 1 acre - lowest lying and completely covered with reed grass, quite boggy, adjacent to a watercourse
The plan going forward is to use all the land (or as much as poss) for summer sheep grazing.
So first thing I'm having done is some ph testing of the various soils. Since the land slopes away towards a watercourse and has been poorly tended to over recent years and the presence of buttercups/reeds...it looks like it is going to be rather acidic. Assuming this is the case, would it be a good idea to have the site limed at this stage? If so, any suggestions on type/quantity? Would it be a good idea to manure/fertilise the land at this stage or could this be left for a future time?
When it comes to the patches of reed grass, I was planning during November to cut these back by hand and spot treat with weedkiller...repeating as necessary.
When it comes to the 1 acre of long grass/buttercups...I was planning on leaving this and letting it die back over winter. This is only the second year it has been let to grow wild like this. Next year i was going to open it up to the sheep again.
As for the marshy area of reed grass near the watercourse, I was just going to leave this as is. It has been left a long time like this and at the end of the day it is fairly unusable. Any suggestions on how best to contain the reed grass and stop it encroaching further into the other fields?
Any other tips/pointers would be much appreciated.
thanks again!