Napier grass cultivation: grow cheap green fodder all year

Feed is the biggest cost on a cattle farm, and bought concentrate is the most expensive part of it. A cow that gets plenty of good green grass needs less concentrate for the same milk or growth. Napier grass is the most popular fodder crop in Bangladesh because it grows fast, regrows after every cut and lives for several years.

Choose a good variety

Improved varieties such as Pakchong, and hybrid Napier lines released by the Bangladesh Livestock Research Institute (BLRI), give more leaf and softer stems than old local Napier. Get cuttings from a known grower or your Upazila Livestock Office so you start with healthy planting material.

Land and soil

• High land or medium-high land that does not stay flooded. Napier hates standing water.
• Loamy soil is best, but it grows on most soils with enough manure.
• Full sun. Under trees it grows thin and weak.

Preparing the land

1. Plough 2–3 times and remove weeds and roots.
2. Mix in well-rotted cow dung, about 30–40 kg per decimal.
3. Make rows so you can weed, fertilise and cut easily.

Planting

• Use stem cuttings with 2–3 nodes (joints) or root slips.
• Plant cuttings at a slant with one node in the soil and one above it.
• A common spacing is about 70 cm between rows and 40–50 cm between plants.
• The best time is the start of the rainy season (April–June), but with irrigation you can plant almost any time except the coldest weeks.

Care after planting

• Water if there is no rain for a week, especially in the first month.
• Weed by hand twice in the first two months; after that the grass shades out most weeds.
• After each cut, apply some nitrogen fertiliser (about half a kilogram of urea per decimal is a common guide) or slurry from a biogas plant, then water.

When and how to cut

• First cut: about 60–75 days after planting.
• Later cuts: every 35–45 days, when the grass is about 1–1.5 metres tall.
• Cut 10–15 cm above the ground with a sharp blade so it regrows quickly.
• Old, tall grass is hard and woody; cows waste much of it. Young grass is softer and more nutritious.

How much do you need?

An adult cow eats roughly 10% of its body weight in fresh green grass a day when grass is the main roughage. A 300 kg cow can eat about 25–30 kg. With good care, a well-managed plot of improved Napier can give many tonnes of green grass per decimal each year, so a small plot behind the house can supply one or two cows.

Feeding tips

• Chop it into 3–5 cm pieces with a chaff cutter or dao. Cows eat more and waste less.
• Mix it with straw for cows that need more fibre and with some concentrate for high-yielding cows.
• Extra grass in the rainy season can be turned into silage for the dry months.
• Wilting freshly cut grass for a few hours in the shade reduces loose dung.

Common mistakes

• Planting in a field that floods in the monsoon
• Letting the grass grow too tall before cutting
• Never adding manure or fertiliser, so yields fall after the first year
• Cutting too close to the ground, which slows regrowth

Keep track of the savings

Record your fodder costs (cuttings, fertiliser, labour) and your concentrate purchases in FarmFlows → Finance. After a few months, compare the feed cost per litre of milk with the period before you grew your own grass.

Quick checklist

• High land, full sun, plenty of rotted dung
• 2–3 node cuttings, about 70 cm × 45 cm spacing
• First cut at 60–75 days, then every 35–45 days
• Cut 10–15 cm above the ground; fertilise after every cut
• Chop before feeding; turn the surplus into silage