pasture: how to get started

This question from a couple of fellow farmers

My husband and I are 66 and 63 respectively. We sold our functioning homestead in 2015 and moved to 17 abused and neglected acres to “retire” and be nearer our children and grandchildren.

Since then we have, in poor judgement, timbered the property (we had NO IDEA!), had heavy equipment come in and “clean up” what the loggers did, and plowed and planted the pastures according to the recommendations of the locals and the county extension agents.

We have a MESS!!

Our question to you is this… What do we need to do to get this property in any productive order this late in the game? Any suggestions or questions you may have for me would be so gratefully appreciated!

Hi, friends,
Sounds like a saga! The best laid plans of mice and men . . .

So: you have a newly cleared and planted pasture, in whatever shape. Without seeing it, we can only say that it needs to be grazed, and the way it is grazed will determine what kind of pasture it becomes. Pasture isn’t a just field full of plants — it’s a field full of plants under grazing pressure, the plants — their species, growth habits, what predominates, etc — being a function of their response to the grazing.
Does that make sense? The plants are a response to the animal pressure — what grows is what the grazing/stomping/manuring/ regrazing makes favorable conditions for.
Your soil has lots of seeds in it other than what the extension folks recommended, and all those seeds together are responding to whatever happens in the way of grazing/rest/neglect.
If you get some cows out there (I assume it’s not too steep/wet for cows?) and start rotating them daily — small paddock/short duration/visible impact/long rest with full recovery — you’ll be managing for the best possible cow forage, because the cow forages are the ones that like good cow pressure.

Sound too good to be true? — well, if Nature didn’t favor beneficial inter-response, the living world wouldn’t be here. When one part of a system behaves in a healthy manner, the other parts are beneficially affected; if you make cows behave as they should (graze/rest) the forages that benefit from that pressure — which are the forages that have enjoyed the benefit of that pressure in the past — will be the ones that fill in.

As for your age — you’re only a few years ahead of us, and you’ve got a background of homesteading. Sure, you’re in a different place here, but the work isn’t new to you. Maybe you won’t be doing all the heavy work yourselves, but I fully intend to be managing cows for another ten or twenty years (which would get me to 79), God willing!
I’d start with a solid perimeter fence and some calm cattle.
Hope this helps!
Shawn and Beth