Pasture and animal behaviour
Lesson resources on pasture quality, soil, stock, and animal behaviour studies.
On this page:
Heliciculture: Farming and feed trails with snails
Students farm snails to explore feed preferences, digestion, growth, and animal behaviour.
Activities include:
- Setting up snail enclosures with moisture, calcium supplements, and identifiable snails
- Measuring growth via weight and shell size
- Running short trials on digestion rates, leaf age, feed freshness, and species differences
- Longer investigations into feed diversity, growth curves, and open experiments with supplementary feeds
These hands‑on trials help students understand pasture quality, animal nutrition, and variability in livestock data, while offering a fun classroom model for animal behaviour studies.
Pasture quality: Plant deconstruction
Explore how plant structure affects nutrition and digestibility. Students investigate pasture species, leaf age, and growth stages to understand feed quality and animal preferences in grazing systems.
Students investigate how ryegrass growth stages affect feed quality.
Activities include:
- Collecting ryegrass samples at different stages (1–4 tillers, transitional, reproductive)
- Cleaning roots and lining plants up to compare height and root depth
- Weighing and dismantling plants into categories: green leaves, fibrous stems, dead material, roots
- Calculating percentage weights and creating bar graphs to visualise plant composition
- Discussing which plant parts and growth stages provide the best nutrition for animals, and the role of roots in plant health
This activity helps students see that more plant material doesn’t always mean better feed, and builds understanding of pasture management, animal nutrition, and grazing decisions.
Pasture foraging: Seeing and tasting diversity
Students explore pasture diversity by safely foraging and tasting common species.
Activities include:
- Learning safe foraging practices (avoiding sprayed areas, roadsides, or unhealthy plants)
- Identifying and collecting species such as clover, plantain, catsear, dandelion, yarrow, and mallow
- Recording notes on taste, texture, bitterness, and fibrousness of each plant
- Comparing pasture species valued by livestock with their nutritional and culinary uses for humans
- Reflecting on how plant diversity influences pasture quality, animal preference, and farm management
This activity helps students connect pasture ecology with animal behaviour and human food use, highlighting the importance of species identification and diversity in farming systems.
Pugged paddocks: Simulation modelling
Learn how soil compaction from livestock impacts pasture growth, water infiltration, and emissions. Students assess pugging effects and explore management strategies to protect soil health and animal productivity.
Students model how livestock movement creates soil compaction and pugging in paddocks.
Activities include:
- Using dice, paddock sheets, and coloured pens to simulate animal movement
- Tracking how water troughs, gates, feed troughs, and break fences influence compaction patterns
- Running multiple rounds to compare scenarios: no fencing, break fencing, and supplementary feeding
- Categorising pugging severity (severe, medium, light) and linking to pasture recovery treatments
- Reflecting on stock behaviour, comparing results with peers, and brainstorming management strategies to reduce pugging
This activity helps students understand how animal behaviour, weather, and farm management practices affect soil health and pasture quality, while introducing simulation modelling as a tool for decision‑making.
Soil management and emissions
Discover how soil care influences pasture productivity and environmental outcomes. Activities highlight nutrient cycling, emissions, and practices that balance farm output with ecological responsibility.
Students investigate how soil microbes and management practices influence carbon emissions.
Activities include:
- Setting up airtight containers with CO₂ meters to track microbial respiration over a week
- Comparing soil conditions: pasture soil, sterilised soil, cultivated soil, cultivated soil with crop residue, and waterlogged soil
- Recording CO₂ levels, graphing results, and interpreting microbial activity under different treatments
- Exploring how soil health, moisture, and organic matter affect greenhouse gas emissions (CO₂, N₂O, CH₄)
- Optional extension: testing urea fertiliser in topsoil to observe nitrogen cycling and ammonia release
This activity highlights the role of soil microbes in carbon cycling, the impact of farming practices on emissions, and the importance of soil management for sustainability and livestock systems.
Thirsty stock: Water requirements
Examine water needs of grazing animals. Students explore hydration, behaviour, and welfare, linking stock water access to productivity, health, and sustainable farm management.
Students explore how species, feed, and environment affect livestock water needs.
Activities include:
- Investigating thermoregulation in cows and sheep, and how temperature impacts milk yield and welfare
- Comparing winter feeding strategies (hay vs. crops) and their effects on animal comfort and heat balance
- Learning about sheep resilience, fleece insulation, and the role of shade in hot conditions
- Using tables of average and peak daily water demand for beef, dairy, sheep, and deer
- Reflecting on how climate, physiology, and management practices influence stock hydration and farm sustainability
This activity highlights the critical role of water in animal health, productivity, and welfare, while linking stock behaviour to environmental conditions and farm management decisions.
The ruminant digestive system
Students are introduced to the ruminant digestive system and its close link to feed and nutrition.
Activities include:
- Watching a video walkthrough of the digestive system by Martin Welby (LU Technician)
- Learning how ruminants process forage through the rumen, reticulum, omasum, and abomasum
- Observing examples of unusual items found trapped in the rumen
- Connecting digestive processes to feed quality, animal health, and farm management decisions
This resource reinforces the importance of understanding ruminant digestion when studying pasture, feed trials, and animal behaviour.
Link to the YouTube video showing a walkthrough of the digestive system – YouTube
