A silage question for you silage experts....

[whitewing]

A few weeks ago I attended a livestock show that was dedicated to the most popular breed of milk cows here in Venezuela, the Carora.

While trying to sell some of my bermuda bales, I struck up a conversation with one ranch owner who was actually interested in buying silage. As he described it, he was interested in buying silage in relatively small plastic bags.....bags of, say, about 40 kilos each.

I have seen a relatively inexpensive machine here that packs silage in tough plastic bags of that size, but as I understand it, that is packing the original raw material in those bags and letting it ferment.

My question is this. If I have an inground silo with fermenting material, can I remove that material, pack it in these smaller bags, transport it a day or so, and have it maintain its nutritional integrity, palatability, and other characteristics until served to his cattle............

Thanks in advance for your replies.

 

[TexasBred]

Whitewing it should work ok as long as the buyer doesn't let it lay around a long time before feeding it. Once exposed to air it will begin to dry and literally decompose.

 

[chippie]

There is a company that markets bagged silage for livestock. The bags are airtight. I've used it for both horses and our milk cows. They love it.

Here is the website. I hope that you find it helpful. http://www.chaffhaye.com/home

 

[Stocker Steve]

Whitewing it should work ok as long as the buyer doesn't let it lay around a long time before feeding it. Once exposed to air it will begin to dry and literally decompose.

It will start to heat in 12 hours unless you can pull a vacuum on it...

 

[gberry]

Whitewing, do you have a picture of the machine or a name brand? Does anyone know of a similar machine here in the US? I have a similar problem and have been looking for a soluiton.

 

[whitewing]

Whitewing, do you have a picture of the machine or a name brand? Does anyone know of a similar machine here in the US? I have a similar problem and have been looking for a soluiton.

Gberry, I have neither at this point but will be visiting the fellow tomorrow who originally offered the machine to me. I suspect that it will be of Brazilian origin as that's where many of our agricultural machines here in Venezuela originate.

 

[SDKid]

I am a long ways from a silage expert, but I wanted to add my $.02 on this.

The first part would be making sure you have a good fermentation process and management practices to start with after that if you are going to move the pile I would look into treating the forage with some type of Lacobacillus Buchneri which will add some expense, but will help greatly maintain the forage during the moving process and open air exposure.