Article Summary: Pasture-based farming is great for livestock, but it comes with its own biosecurity challenges. This article explores the unique risks that grazing systems face and how you can manage them. We’ll discuss how diseases can spread through open fences, wildlife visitors, and even the grass under your animals’ feet. You’ll learn about controlling interactions with neighbouring livestock and wildlife to prevent disease exchange. We also dive into parasite management—since animals grazing on the same pasture can pick up worms—and how rotational grazing helps. From keeping water sources clean to cleaning equipment that moves between paddocks, these practical tips will help you safeguard your animals while they enjoy the pasture. Strengthening biosecurity in your fields means healthier herds and more productive pastures.
Unique Biosecurity Challenges in Pasture-Based Farms
If you run a grazing operation—whether it’s cattle in open fields, sheep on rangeland, or goats browsing a pasture—you know the joys of seeing livestock free-roaming and eating fresh forage. Pasture-based systems are often healthier and more natural for animals compared to confined systems. However, the open nature of grazing also brings unique biosecurity challenges. Unlike a barn or feedlot, where you can tightly control entry and exit, a pasture farm has many “open borders.” Your animals share a larger environment with wildlife and possibly neighbouring livestock. They’re exposed to soil, water, and plants that might carry diseases or pests. None of this is a reason to avoid grazing (grazing is great!), but it does mean we have to be extra mindful of certain risks and manage them smartly.
Let’s explore some key biosecurity risks in pasture systems and how you, as a grazing livestock farmer, can address them.
Wildlife and Neighbor Interactions: Uninvited Visitors
Out on pasture, your herd or flock is not alone. Wild birds might peck around the feeders, deer might graze alongside your cattle at the fence line, or rodents might scurry through feed troughs at night. Even friendly neighbour livestock could stroll over if fences fail. Each of these interactions is a potential biosecurity risk.
Wild animals can carry diseases that jump to livestock. For example, waterfowl can introduce avian influenza to free-range poultry, wild pigs can carry swine diseases, and deer can spread bovine tuberculosis or brucellosis to cattle. Increasing wildlife-livestock contact raises the chance for pathogen transmission and even new diseases to emerge. We saw just how significant these spillovers can be with the COVID-19 pandemic (originating in wildlife). On a farm level, one sick wild animal wandering through could leave behind disease agents.
Similarly, if your neighbour’s livestock grazes adjacent to yours, diseases or parasites don’t respect property lines. Nose-to-nose contact through a fence or a stray animal that breaks in with your herd can swap germs quickly.
What can you do? Complete isolation isn’t practical (or desirable) in open farming, but there are ways to reduce risks:
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Secure Your Boundaries: Ensure fences are robust and check them regularly. A double fence (with a gap in between) or an electric offset fence can prevent direct contact between your animals and your neighbour’s, as well as deter wild deer from touching noses with your cattle. This also helps keep your livestock in and stray animals out. It’s like maintaining a good fence as the first line of defence.
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Collaborate with Neighbours: Good communication with neighbouring farms goes a long way. Let each other know if you notice illnesses. Coordinate on parasite control if possible (for instance, if both of you deworm around the same time, there’s less risk of each reinfecting the other’s herd across the fence). In fact, working together with neighbours to minimise the spread of diseases, weeds, and pests benefits everyone. You might even sync grazing patterns to break pest cycles (e.g., resting bordering paddocks simultaneously).
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Wildlife Management: While you can’t exclude all wildlife, identify high-risk species and find deterrents. If feral pigs are an issue, consider trapping or working with wildlife control to reduce their numbers. If birds are transmitting parasites or diseases, use bird netting on feed troughs or scare devices. For rodents, keep grass around feed areas short and use rodent control measures. Essentially, make your farm less attractive to pests: secure feed storage (lid on feed bins), clean up spilled grain, and cover or fence off water sources like ponds if they attract wild waterfowl.
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Monitor and Report: Keep an eye out for signs of unusual wildlife deaths or behaviour on and near your farm. If you find a dead wild bird or deer without obvious cause, report it to authorities – it might indicate a disease in the area. Also, if you hunt or allow hunting on your land, follow guidelines for handling game to avoid bringing diseases to your livestock (e.g., properly disposing of offal).
By being proactive with fences, neighbours, and wildlife deterrence, you create a buffer that makes it harder for outside creatures to bring trouble into your pasture.
Parasites and Pasture: The Invisible Threat Underfoot
When livestock graze, they’re not just sharing grass – they often share parasites. Internal parasites (like roundworms, barber pole worms, liver fluke, etc.) are a constant companion of grazing animals. These parasites have life cycles that involve being deposited on pasture in manure, developing into larvae, and then being ingested by another animal as it grazes. In a continuously grazed pasture, this cycle can run unchecked, leading to heavy parasite loads in your herd.
Continuous grazing of the same paddock increases pasture contamination and reinfection by worm larvae. Essentially, if animals keep grazing and defecating on the same plot, they’ll keep picking up each other’s parasites. Over time, this not only harms animal health (causing weight loss, anemia, and poor production) but also can lead to parasites that are resistant to dewormers because of frequent treatment.
Biosecurity in pasture-based systems absolutely includes parasite management. Here’s how you can break the parasite cycle and keep those worms at bay:
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Rotational Grazing: This is a superstar strategy. By rotating animals through multiple paddocks and allowing pasture rest periods, you can reduce the buildup of parasites. When a paddock is rested (no animals grazing) for a certain length of time, many parasite larvae die off before they find a host. For example, some worm larvae can only survive on pasture for a few weeks to a couple of months, so a rest longer than that can “cleanse” the pasture. As a bonus, rotational grazing improves pasture regrowth and utilization. It’s a win-win: healthier grass and fewer parasites. In fact, strategic grazing management helps reduce the number of worm eggs and larvae on pasture, cutting down how many parasites your sheep or cattle ingest.
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Paddock Spelling for Vulnerable Stock: Consider preparing low-parasite paddocks for your most vulnerable animals (like lambs, kids, or calves, and pregnant or lactating females). One approach is to graze a paddock with older, parasite-resistant animals or a different species, then later move the vulnerable group onto it. Or use hay cutting to rest a field. The idea is to have “cleaner” pasture ready for animals that can’t handle parasites well.
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Mixed Species Grazing: If feasible, run multiple species on your pastures sequentially or together. Many parasites are species-specific (for example, most cattle worms don’t thrive in sheep and vice versa). Grazing sheep behind cattle or cattle behind sheep can dilute parasite problems—one species cleans up the other’s larvae, effectively. Even grazing something like horses or alpacas in rotation with ruminants can help because they break the cycle of ruminant parasites.
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Regular Fecal Checks and Targeted Deworming: Instead of routine blanket deworming (which can breed resistance), use fecal egg count tests to monitor parasite levels in your herd. Treat only when needed and ideally only the individuals that need it. This keeps drug effectiveness longer. When you do deworm, doing it before moving animals to a fresh pasture can help keep that new pasture cleaner (they’ll shed fewer eggs there). Always follow withdrawal times and vet advice for dewormers.
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Pasture Hygiene: Avoid overstocking – crowded pastures mean more manure per acre and higher parasite exposure. If using temporary paddocks or night corrals on pasture, try to move them frequently to avoid creating “worm hotspot” areas. Also, spread manure in hay fields or compost it rather than just letting manure piles sit where animals graze. Composting can kill many parasite eggs with heat.
Parasite control is an ongoing dance in pasture farming. But with these practices, you essentially implement a biosecurity program against worms. Healthier animals will result, and you won’t have to spend as much on dewormers or vet bills for parasite-related illnesses.
Weeds, Pests, and Contaminated Fields
Pastures can harbour more than just parasites. Weeds and pests can also pose biosecurity issues. Some weeds are toxic to livestock; others might not directly cause disease but can carry harmful organisms. For example, certain thorny weeds might injure animals, creating wounds where infections can start. Pests like ticks live in grass and can transmit diseases like anaplasmosis or Lyme. And then there are soil-borne diseases (like anthrax spores in certain regions, or clostridial bacteria) that lurk in fields.
Moreover, the movement of soil and plant material between fields or farms can spread both weeds and diseases. If you contract machinery or share equipment with other farms (like a neighbour’s tractor to do some ploughing), you might inadvertently introduce weed seeds or disease agents stuck to that equipment. Vehicles and machinery are known vectors for spreading weeds, pests, and diseases via soil and plant debris.
Here’s how to mitigate these pasture-based risks:
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Weed Management: Maintain healthy, dense pastures to outcompete weeds. Regularly scout your fields for new or unusual plants. If you spot a potentially poisonous weed (like tansy ragwort, nightshade, etc.), remove it promptly—wear gloves and dispose of it far away, don’t just drop it on the ground. Implement a weed control program (mowing before seed set, targeted herbicides if necessary, or biological control if applicable). Weeds might seem like just a nuisance, but some can seriously harm livestock or degrade pasture quality. Plus, dense weed growth can harbour more ticks and pests. Keeping weeds in check is both a production and a biosecurity boon.
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Vehicle and Equipment Hygiene: Any tractor, truck, or implement that’s been off your farm (or used in different paddocks with weed infestations) should be cleaned before entering your fields. Remove soil, seeds, and plant matter from machinery—brush or power-wash if possible. Seeds can cling to the tiniest crevice. The same goes for disease: clubroot in canola fields, for instance, spreads farm to farm on muddy machinery. As a livestock farmer, focus on cleaning anything that goes between farms or between segregated areas of your farm. If you’ve got contractors (fencers, earth-movers) coming in, insist they clean gear beforehand. A simple “Keep it Clean” protocol for machinery can greatly limit weed and disease spread.
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People Movement in Pastures: If you have visitors who tour your fields (maybe other farmers coming to see your setup, or hunters, etc.), remember their boots can carry seeds and pathogens, too. Provide a boot brush and disinfectant for people entering and leaving pastures, especially if they’ve been hiking or working in other farms’ fields. As one guideline puts it, “Seeds can be on boots or animal hooves” and easily travel this way. So, clean footwear and even tyres of ATVs or trucks that drive through fields.
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Tick and Insect Control: Depending on your region, you may need to manage insect vectors. This could mean treating fields or animals for ticks, using fly control (flies can spread pinkeye in cattle or parasites like eye worms), or reducing standing water, which breeds mosquitoes (carriers of diseases like West Nile Virus or encephalitis). Chickens or guinea fowl in pasture areas can help eat ticks (just ensure they don’t create their own biosecurity issues with diseases like Marek’s—manage them well). Use pour-on treatments or tick collars on livestock if tick-borne disease is a concern, under vet guidance.
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Soil-Borne Disease Precautions: If your area has known soil-borne diseases (like anthrax in certain hot spots), talk to a vet about vaccinations or additional measures. In some cases, you might avoid grazing in low areas after floods (floodwater can spread nasty bacteria). Having different “zones” on your farm can help; for instance, designate some paddocks for high-risk periods or animals and manage accordingly.
The theme is to treat your pasture like a living, shared space that needs occasional guarding and cleaning—much like you’d clean a barn, you “clean” your fields by managing weeds and pests and not bringing in external contaminants.
Practical Tips to Secure Your Pastures
Let’s summarize with some everyday practical tips that you can apply to tighten biosecurity on your pasture-based farm:
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Provide Clean Water Sources: Instead of letting animals drink from natural streams or ponds (which can be visited by wildlife or contaminated upstream), try to provide water troughs with a controlled water source. If you use a stream, fence most of it off and have a limited access point that’s easier to monitor and clean. This reduces the chance of water-borne diseases (like leptospirosis, which can be spread by wildlife urine in water). Fencing off water sources also prevents livestock from defecating in them, keeping them cleaner.
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Manage Feed on Pasture: If you supplement grazing with hay or grain on the field, use feeders rather than throwing feed on the ground. This not only prevents waste but also stops feed from getting trampled into the soil, where it can grow mould or attract pests. Clean up old hay residue – it can harbour fungus or bacteria. And always source quality feed; a biosecurity plan is useless if you accidentally import a disease through something like contaminated hay (e.g., hay from an area with a weed you don’t want, or that was stored in a rodent-infested barn picking up Salmonella).
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Footbath at Pasture Entry: Consider setting up a simple footbath or scrubbing station at the entrance to sensitive pastures, particularly if those pastures host youngstock or have had disease issues in the past. A plastic tub with a disinfectant solution that people step in, or a brush to scrub boots, can reduce what’s tracked in. This is especially useful if multiple people or contractors might walk the fields (like during shearing time for sheep, or contractors checking fence lines).
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Isolate Sick Animals on Pasture: If an animal falls ill, move it to a “sick paddock” away from the main group. We often think of isolating in a barn, but in some cases having a quarantine paddock is even better (fresh air, sunshine can help, and you keep the barn clean for others). Mark that paddock and don’t use it for other animals until an appropriate time has passed and maybe after mowing and resting it. For instance, if you suspect a worm overload caused illness, keep that paddock empty to break the cycle.
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Use Pasture.io or Mapping Tools: This is a bit of tech in service of biosecurity—use a digital map of your farm (Pasture.io allows mapping and tracking of paddocks) to note any problem areas. For example, mark spots where poisonous plants were found, or where an animal died of disease, or where you’ve applied manure. This kind of record helps you avoid grazing vulnerable animals there too soon. It’s a subtle integration of biosecurity thinking into pasture management planning. By recording events on your pasture map, you make smarter, safer grazing decisions later.
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Regular Pasture Walks: Walk your pastures often (which many graziers do anyway to check grass growth). During these walks, keep an eye out for anything unusual: signs of digging (feral pigs rooting?), clusters of deer droppings, standing water, new weed patches, etc. Early spotting means early action. If you find, say, deer droppings in quantity, you might decide to vaccinate your herd for leptospirosis or at least test your water. If you notice a section of fence down, you’ll fix it before your cattle mingle with the neighbour’s bulls.
Pasture farming will always have a touch of the wild to it—that’s part of its beauty. You won’t control every bird in the sky or every microorganism in the soil. But by adopting these practices, you greatly stack the odds in your favour. You create a system where your animals can graze contentedly, and you can rest easier knowing you’ve lessened the major risks.
In essence, strong biosecurity in grazing systems is about smart management of land and livestock. It’s working with nature’s rhythms (like rotational grazing) to outsmart the bad bugs and being vigilant about the few things that could go wrong. With a little effort and consistency, your pastures can remain the happy, vibrant heart of your farm—free of unwelcome diseases and pests.
Until we meet again, Happy Grazing!
- The Dedicated Team of Pasture.io, 2025-02-11