Feeding Hay

[hooknline]

remember though also, they will clean up the hay before they eat the pasture most of the time. Most animals will take the higher nutrient forage over the rest, leaving the lower nutrient stuff for when they run out of the good stuff. All this does is make them spoiled, at least in my limited experience.

[angus9259]

Maybe I've had the luxury of having more hay avaible than some people, but we keep our hay racks and hay feeding trailers stuffed full all of the time. That means we might feed 5 bales some days and 50 others. Not all of our hay is the same quality and I feel the cow is a better judge of what she needs to fill her up than I am. Some types of hay they eat more of than others.

Just my opinion that its easier to keep a cow up than it is to let her go down a little and then try to get her back.

Making them clean up the hay is a long way from letting then lose any condition.

Yup. This is what we do except I'll probably wait half a day. I'll fill the round feeders, wait till the cows are just picking at what's on the bottom and giving me stink eye for it, then take out fresh hay the next morning.

Actually, that stops a LOT of the complaining too. I've found that if they complain and the tractor starts rolling, they learn to complain. I think my teenagers taught them that. When I got caught in that trap, they were complaining half way through a bale.

[JRGidaho`]

remember though also, they will clean up the hay before they eat the pasture most of the time. Most animals will take the higher nutrient forage over the rest, leaving the lower nutrient stuff for when they run out of the good stuff. All this does is make them spoiled, at least in my limited experience.

Interesting. Our cows always preferred stockpiled pasture to hay. When we were space-bale feeding, they would always graze out all the grass around the bales first before they took any hay.

Maybe that's just a testimony to how poor of hay we made????

[hooknline]

remember though also, they will clean up the hay before they eat the pasture most of the time. Most animals will take the higher nutrient forage over the rest, leaving the lower nutrient stuff for when they run out of the good stuff. All this does is make them spoiled, at least in my limited experience.

Interesting. Our cows always preferred stockpiled pasture to hay. When we were space-bale feeding, they would always graze out all the grass around the bales first before they took any hay.

Maybe that's just a testimony to how poor of hay we made????

Your hay may have been perfect, who knows. Cattle are all animals and each animal is different. Its just been my experience that when I throw out hay they leave the pasture alone till the easy pickings is gone. then they will go back to the pasture.

[dun]

remember though also, they will clean up the hay before they eat the pasture most of the time. Most animals will take the higher nutrient forage over the rest, leaving the lower nutrient stuff for when they run out of the good stuff. All this does is make them spoiled, at least in my limited experience.

Interesting. Our cows always preferred stockpiled pasture to hay. When we were space-bale feeding, they would always graze out all the grass around the bales first before they took any hay.

Maybe that's just a testimony to how poor of hay we made????

We must make lousey hay too. Ours might grab a mouthfull now and then but they far prefer to glean anyting they can off of the pasture.

[hooknline]

I wasnt saying anyone makes bad hay. But everytime I put out a round bale of alfalfa, the cows always came running, and left the bahia field to sit there and grow until the hay was gone.
I would think that if your cows arent eating the hay, then you both have really good pastures! Nice work.

[angus9259]

I wasnt saying anyone makes bad hay. But everytime I put out a round bale of alfalfa, the cows always came running, and left the bahia field to sit there and grow until the hay was gone.
I would think that if your cows arent eating the hay, then you both have really good pastures! Nice work.

Yup - a cows like a human - it knows what will make it fat and it will eat that first.

My cows would snuggle up to a bale of alfalfa all day long before picking through my pastures. In fact, if I moved the water out to them, I doubt if they would move at all.

[JRGidaho`]

I wasnt saying anyone makes bad hay. But everytime I put out a round bale of alfalfa, the cows always came running, and left the bahia field to sit there and grow until the hay was gone.
I would think that if your cows arent eating the hay, then you both have really good pastures! Nice work.

hook,

I knew you weren't saying we made bad hay. My comment was a little bit tongue-in-cheek. dun is from MO and I used to be. We readily admit our hay is less than ideal!

It is easy to grow good pasture in MO, but hard to make decent hay due to the weather. That is one of the reasons we got away from making and using any hay. Expense was the biggest reason.

But you're right, cows will develop their own preferences and just when you think you really have them figured out, they'll fool you.

[dun]

But you're right, cows will develop their own preferences and just when you think you really have them figured out, they'll fool you.

When ours are on really good WSG pasture they'll knock down a fence to get to the old summer stressed fescue. We board some cows for a neighbor that are fed WSG hay during the winter and they'll knock down a fence to get away from the fescue and eat the old stemmy and poor WSG. I really think a lot of it has to do with what they're used to that helps to build their preferences.

[chenocetah]

Aero - I didn't leave out those costs, they were included.

[hooknline]

I wasnt saying anyone makes bad hay. But everytime I put out a round bale of alfalfa, the cows always came running, and left the bahia field to sit there and grow until the hay was gone.
I would think that if your cows arent eating the hay, then you both have really good pastures! Nice work.

hook,

I knew you weren't saying we made bad hay. My comment was a little bit tongue-in-cheek. dun is from MO and I used to be. We readily admit our hay is less than ideal!

It is easy to grow good pasture in MO, but hard to make decent hay due to the weather. That is one of the reasons we got away from making and using any hay. Expense was the biggest reason.

But you're right, cows will develop their own preferences and just when you think you really have them figured out, they'll fool you.

No worries, I just wanted to make sure I wasnt taken the wrong way. I have spent quite a bit of time in MO, and it can be hard to bale, with the wet summer into fall. Hard to get hay to dry with all that rain, esp the last couple years.

[dun]

in MO, and it can be hard to bale, with the wet summer into fall. Hard to get hay to dry with all that rain, esp the last couple years.

It does seem like either there isn;t enough rain to make good hay or there is too much rain to get it to dry right.

[Aero]

Aero - I didn't leave out those costs, they were included.

hmm... that would be very surprising.

[MoGal]

in MO, and it can be hard to bale, with the wet summer into fall. Hard to get hay to dry with all that rain, esp the last couple years.

It does seem like either there isn;t enough rain to make good hay or there is too much rain to get it to dry right.

Here, here, I'll second that and add to it that we get either too much rain in a short period or not enough...... even the grain crops....... of course if one knew ahead of time one could play the futures market pretty good.

[chenocetah]

Aero - If you are spending more than $12 in eq, parts, fuel, supplies and labor & more than $3 in trans costs just to put up a 4 x 5 net bale on the average, then you are spending more than is necessary to get the job done.