Bale grazing vs Fertilize for Pasture Improvement

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Hill, like kenny, if I do at all. Most of my place is not flat. I have rolled it off the truck bed in a pinch. Rolled them off the tractor forks over the fence before. Not a great idea in hindsight.... They really aren't to hard to roll when you get them going. To much waste for my small operation. I tear them apart and make wind rows for the cows for the last couple years.

Normal people use an unroller and tractor like mentioned above.
 
I built this unroller. I insert the spikes manually. The sides move in/out hydraulically to accomodate different size bales, and I'm able to "clamp" a bale in it then to keep it from rolling until I want it to (comes in handy particularly with bales that want to fall apart too quickly, or like when unrolling in the corral and tight areas). I take a 2nd bale along to the pasture on the 3 pt. carrier. LOVE it! Unroll about 1000 bales a year with it. No "moving parts" to wear out, versatile, can unroll easily into ditches and other uneven ground areas that need "repair", can get into corrals etc., easily (like to entice the herd in). Takes up minimal shed space when not in use..., entirely self-propelled and self-contained unit, easy to drop off and use the tractor for other things with the skid-loader QT system.

I would disagree with the comment that cattle don't "add" anything to the decomposing bale. They exponentially add biological components that otherwise you won't have without running it through them. It's not just about the "fertility" (NPK analysis) of the hay or manure... that's just the "chemical component". The microbes ARE the much bigger part of any fertility program. THEY are what builds the aggregation, and water holding and infiltration capacity, and nitrogen capture and THEY feed the plants. BUT... the micro-biology also needs to be fed... organic matter. The hay residue provides that organic matter, and it provides a "house/habitat" for the micro-biological elements to function within.

Unroll the hay, if you can at all, IMO. I know you don't currently have an unroller... GET ONE! I don't care what kind... they all "work"... some just work better in some situations and for certain individuals than others... but they all accomplish the same goal... spreading out the bale across the pasture instead of dumping it all in one spot! Spread the wealth across as many acres as you can. In areas where it may need some extra help, unroll more often, NOT just "deeper", which is what happens with bale grazing. Bale grazing generally results in the application of "too much of a good thing", overwhelming the capabilities of the soil biology to keep up and keep functioning optimally, which is why it requires "time" to recover back to full production levels ("dead spots" in the field for a year or two... they're not "dead"... the soil is actually very alive biologically, but the conditions prohibit the growth of much forages until it can "stabilize" it to where the forages "can thrive in it" again). You could apply the same amount of hay residue over the same amount of area by applying it in multiple different "applications", but the net result cumulatively will be better with bale unrolling, because you allowed the biology of the soil "R&R time" in between those applications, and you never "overwhelmed" it.

Think of it this way... you need water to survive, and with the right amount of water, you can THRIVE. But you need some water everyday, at a specific proper amount every day. But if I have to bring you your water every day, and I decide to cut corners to make it easier FOR ME, and I just bring a whole years worth of water to you, and I dump it on you, maybe even put a ring around you so that it can't "escape" by just running off... you're going to DROWN! Same way with the microbes. They can only handle "so much". Smaller doses, with "R&R" allowed between them, will help them to thrive, rather than "drowning them" with "too much of a good thing". It really is that simple.

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Hill, like kenny, if I do at all. Most of my place is not flat. I have rolled it off the truck bed in a pinch. Rolled them off the tractor forks over the fence before. Not a great idea in hindsight.... They really aren't to hard to roll when you get them going. To much waste for my small operation. I tear them apart and make wind rows for the cows for the last couple years.

Normal people use an unroller and tractor like mentioned above.
🤔 If only normal people use a tractor and unroller, I know a WHOLE LOT of abnormal livestock owners. So many that I'd have to say abnormal is normal. :sneaky::p😆
 
can't really unroll too much on a place as long as the ground will hold up. if its a wet area you need to wait for it to be dry enough to feed on. I rolled out 150 bales on 10 acres last year and it did wonderful. Thats about all the soil could handle and it started getting pretty soft so I got them off of it. got good results from it.
 
Rule of Thumb, Cheaper hay=more weed seeds!
The weed seeds are already in his ground. Plus, the weeds are the ones that'll correct the PH and soil nutrient problems if given the opportunity and time to do so. Will require some mowing or a grazing plan to get dialed in. Diversity is good.

Sounds like that's the approach they're leaning towards if I understand correctly.
 
can't really unroll too much on a place as long as the ground will hold up. if its a wet area you need to wait for it to be dry enough to feed on. I rolled out 150 bales on 10 acres last year and it did wonderful. Thats about all the soil could handle and it started getting pretty soft so I got them off of it. got good results from it.
doing the dance here right now too. It's so wet out there.

It's wasteful to unroll here right now. I place whole bales out until the ground dries or freezes.
 
Yup... that's the all important "context"... I'm fortunate that we've got poor man's concrete for the majority of our feeding season! Is that my "unfair advantage"? This winter's been unusual to date... Ground's been frozen and holding until the inch of rain we got Saturday... the top thawed out some with that, but its frozen again now. Been grazing stockpiled forages for the whole month of December. For 100 head, I've only unrolled 6 bales so far, and two of those were to entice them into the corral to work them. They come and look and take a bit when I show up with bales, but within a half hour they've mostly gone back to the stockpile. Gotta love it! Temps start dropping after today though, with below 0 by Wednesday night... and snow too.
 
🤔 If only normal people use a tractor and unroller, I know a WHOLE LOT of abnormal livestock owners. So many that I'd have to say abnormal is normal. :sneaky::p😆
All you banana belters don't have to go through 2' of snow! We could never consider moving bales with anything but a decent tractor... and a cab is about a necessity below 0! The front wheels on it aren't powered though... put them on to impress onlookers! When the deeper snow comes, I have to put on a set of chains.
 
Is a tractor without powered front wheels really even a tractor? Lol

I couldn't unroll on pasture without a fairly large MFWD tractor. Guys with 2wd tractors around here are typically forced to feed close to the gate where it's packed and frozen solid.
They're so durned expensive though... I figured I'd kinda work my way there one tire at a time! At least everybody THINKS I've got one! And image is about as important as anything, ... isn't it?:unsure:
 
They are only expensive when you buy them. Get it back if you ever sell.

And it sure as heck beats being stuck in a snow drift 3/4 of a mile out in a field when it's -20.

Then I always have a bucket the loader so I can push myself backwards when I do get stuck. Ha
 
All you banana belters don't have to go through 2' of snow! We could never consider moving bales with anything but a decent tractor... and a cab is about a necessity below 0! The front wheels on it aren't powered though... put them on to impress onlookers! When the deeper snow comes, I have to put on a set of chains.
I was impressed by the front tires because i hadn't seen one like that. But the bigger tires do stand up better to using a loader.
 
I was impressed by the front tires because i hadn't seen one like that. But the bigger tires do stand up better to using a loader.
They carry the load better, they keep you up out of the mud better, they "push" easier... AND... they turn shorter than a FWA... especially one of that vintage. AND maybe best of all, THEY'RE YELLOW!:rolleyes: That ought to add at least a few thousand to the value of my tractor. ...I put bigger wheels and tires on the back end of my combine, and moved these over onto here.
 
The whole 'bale grazing' thing is anathema to me. We bought in all our hay. Paid too dear a price for it just to let the cows waste and trample in half of it.
Unrolling - we'd put out one day's ration, about 25#/cow/day, and let them back out to it after they consumed their DDG ration in the barnlot. They'd clean up the hay in about 2 hours. Even on muddy days, there was minimal wastage/trampling-in; on days when the ground was frozen, barely a sprig not consumed.
 
I'm kinda late in the discussion. We are trying the 'hay to fertilizer' method since a couple years. In general...... yes I like it. But there are some factors I don't like about it. First of all I agree what most of you said, unrolling definitely better then bale grazing. The build up is much too localized and thick with the bale grazing.
We had some poor hay last year, thought it would be perfect to feed/fertilize on poor hayfield, but in the aftermath it wasn't. If it's poor hay the cows will leave more and the build up can be quite thick, even unrolled. Suppose if you just use the field for pasture it doesn't matter all too much, but we wanted to get next years hay, even if poor. The cows used said build up then as bedding, where they bed you'll have a lot more cow piles. In spring we took harrows over those piles. Just diamond harrows, not fancy spring type harrows ( can't afford those LOL) Ended up being a stupid nightmare because the thicker build up didn't break up but kept on rolling into wads. Those needed to be moved with the loader, very time consuming.
Point to that story is that I would not use poor hay destined as feed/fertilizer anymore unless it is on pasture only. On hayfield/pasture we only use unrolled good bales now. There is minimal, if any, left over build up. All that's left is cow s&it, just like we want it. Still have to take harrows to break up the turds, but that's ok.

About ways to unroll. Using existing slope was our main go for many many years, but, depending on how much slope is available you'll have quite a build up there too over the years (unless it's just 10 cows you feed), plus damage to fence and fence posts on the bottom of the slope adds up over the years, no matter how hard you try to keep bales from going that far. Bought a bale unroller about 7 years ago and wouldn't want to feed without it ever again.

There, that's my 5 cents after the fact. All we can do is share experiences, in the end we all have to learn by trying different things and seeing the benefit or downside to it. Every operation is completely different, temperature, lay of the land, soil type, how much time is put into it and what we raise.
 
With unrolling, how heavy a swath you lay down is almost entirely dependent on how big the swath was when it went into the bale. I feed mostly my own bales... and I rake small swaths at baling specifically so that they unroll over a much longer distance... 1/8 to sometimes as much as 1/4 mile/5x6 bale. My custom baler doesn't mind. The better the hay, the less they'll leave behind as armor on the soil. If I want more armor, I'll feed across that area again, after a decent rest period... I've unrolled across some "need improvement" areas as many as 4 times through a winter... but generally, I'd prefer to cover as much of my pasture with unrolled hay as I can. I like to bale first crop after it's got viable seed, so that it reseeds that pastures for me. Much of my "hay" is pastures that the cattle weren't able to keep up with, but some is "hayfields" that I haven't gotten fenced yet.
 
Yeah if you bale thick windrows then typically you will unroll a thick mat. I typically unroll opposite to the direction they were baled, don't get a thick ribbon of hay laid down more random patches.

Our summer is to short and weather windows are too precious to spend extra time baling 2x as many windrows.
 

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