Feed Pad

[Bright Raven]

Scraped my feed pad today. Notice no calves????? They got their own quarters. :cboy:

We had a bad ice storm. Ice was still hanging around today.

 

[Bigfoot]

Does your county own a manure spreader?

 

[Bright Raven]

Does your county own a manure spreader?

No. I got to hire it moved. I am running out of space.

 

[True Grit Farms]

I take it the cows are stuck there just eating hay and feed? They have no woods or pasture to scrounge around and try to pick something up to eat on their own?

 

[Bright Raven]

I take it the cows are stuck there just eating hay and feed? They have no woods or pasture to scrounge around and try to pick something up to eat on their own?

There is access to pasture on the left. It goes down into a big holler. Lots of big trees along the holler. In bad weather, they get the kids in tow and go down there out of wind and into the shelter of trees.

 

[kenny thomas]

Can never understand trying to haul manure when you can just unroll hay.

 

[Bright Raven]

Can never understand trying to haul manure when you can just unroll hay.

Kenny,

I came to this feeding layout because of my steep terrain. In addition, if you take a tractor off gravel here, you are going in to the axle. I could unroll on the ridge in the background but I cut hay off that. Unrolling back there would cut the field up. The pastures are steep and in the mud ( very muddy winters here), you would have a mess, at worse, you would have your tractor even 4×4 in the holler.

Odd area, I put water lines in and never so much as hit a gravel. Solid clay. And when it is saturated, there is no bottom.

 

[kenny thomas]

Set rolls out when dry or froze. Poly wire around them. Move wire and unroll 1 roll as needed down the steep slope.

 

[kenny thomas]

Been wet here. Sunny tomorrow. Steep hills. I will set out 2 rolls in each paddock. That's enough to do them a week and I will unroll each day.

 

[TCRanch]

Does your county own a manure spreader?

No. I got to hire it moved. I am running out of space.

Is there a local landscaping business? Some of them actually pay for good manure/fertilizer but we have an agreement with one; they scrape/load/haul away. We don't charge or have to do the work and they end up with some serious fertilizer that they can then use on their projects or sell.

 

[Bright Raven]

Does your county own a manure spreader?

No. I got to hire it moved. I am running out of space.

Is there a local landscaping business? Some of them actually pay for good manure/fertilizer but we have an agreement with one; they scrape/load/haul away. We don't charge or have to do the work and they end up with some serious fertilizer that they can then use on their projects or sell.

Yes. There are a couple. I like the idea but I would like to spread it on my hayfield.

 

[Lazy M]

No. I got to hire it moved. I am running out of space.

Is there a local landscaping business? Some of them actually pay for good manure/fertilizer but we have an agreement with one; they scrape/load/haul away. We don't charge or have to do the work and they end up with some serious fertilizer that they can then use on their projects or sell.

Yes. There are a couple. I like the idea but I would like to spread it on my hayfield.

Definitely. Don't give that smelly gold away, use it!

 

[ky colonel]

how did you setup your feed pad?

 

[Ky hills]

Feed pads are nice, have a that kind of setup behind the barn where we can let cattle in from 3 fields to eat grain, also have a couple fields with them to feed hay on, for the same reasons that Bright Raven stated. About midway through last winter, I realized I was going through hay pretty fast trying to set out enough to last 2-3 days, SkyHighTree suggested I unroll it, and have been doing that ever since. For some of the cattle groups, it puts me to doing it every day, and others about every other day, but it has really saved the hay, and doesn't seem like they are wasting it near as bad. It can get kind of hairy if it's very muddy or snow/ice but I try to stay on the gravel road, at least with one side of the tractor so the hay doesn't get dropped off down it a rutted out track, or in other places without a road on flat part of a ridge, and push the hay roll over the hill.
On a side note that manure and from hay feeding pads makes some fine stuff to spread on hay fields and garden.

 

[Bright Raven]

how did you setup your feed pad?

I put down a layer of number 2 limestone gravel (see chart below, #2 is 3 1/2 to 1 1/2). Then choked it over with "mine waste run". That does not appear on the chart. It is the waste from screening gravel. The mine gives it to who ever hauls it off so I only pay a $200 hauling charge for 30 tons. I don't know if you can get mine waste run where you are but it sets up like concrete.

 

[ky colonel]

how does it save more by rolling out? i would like to see more pics of the feed pad. i need something i end up in a muddy mess. thought about dropping rolls off in pasture at different locations to spread that manure around by the professionals.

 

[Bright Raven]

Feed pads are nice, have a that kind of setup behind the barn where we can let cattle in from 3 fields to eat grain, also have a couple fields with them to feed hay on, for the same reasons that Bright Raven stated. About midway through last winter, I realized I was going through hay pretty fast trying to set out enough to last 2-3 days, SkyHighTree suggested I unroll it, and have been doing that ever since. For some of the cattle groups, it puts me to doing it every day, and others about every other day, but it has really saved the hay, and doesn't seem like they are wasting it near as bad. It can get kind of hairy if it's very muddy or snow/ice but I try to stay on the gravel road, at least with one side of the tractor so the hay doesn't get dropped off down it a rutted out track, or in other places without a road on flat part of a ridge, and push the hay roll over the hill.
On a side note that manure and from hay feeding pads makes some fine stuff to spread on hay fields and garden.

In the area where you unroll it - don't the cows make a muddy mess of the ground? Resulting in damaging the pasture or do you have an area you sacrifice for unrolling?

 

[Ohio Cowboy]

BR- when you clean off your pad do you pull up a ton of stone ??? I feel like it would be like spreading stone on my pastures.

 

[Bright Raven]

BR- when you clean off your pad do you pull up a ton of stone ??? I feel like it would be like spreading stone on my pastures.

No. Not much but it does pull some up - very few. What I wonder is whether the few stones it pulls up might be thrown into your tractor cab glass. We had a manure spreader when I was growing up. The paddles would throw some up to the front.

I am careful to keep the bucket riding above the stone,

 

[Ky hills]

Feed pads are nice, have a that kind of setup behind the barn where we can let cattle in from 3 fields to eat grain, also have a couple fields with them to feed hay on, for the same reasons that Bright Raven stated. About midway through last winter, I realized I was going through hay pretty fast trying to set out enough to last 2-3 days, SkyHighTree suggested I unroll it, and have been doing that ever since. For some of the cattle groups, it puts me to doing it every day, and others about every other day, but it has really saved the hay, and doesn't seem like they are wasting it near as bad. It can get kind of hairy if it's very muddy or snow/ice but I try to stay on the gravel road, at least with one side of the tractor so the hay doesn't get dropped off down it a rutted out track, or in other places without a road on flat part of a ridge, and push the hay roll over the hill.
On a side note that manure and from hay feeding pads makes some fine stuff to spread on hay fields and garden.

In the area where you unroll it - don't the cows make a muddy mess of the ground? Resulting in damaging the pasture or do you have an area you sacrifice for unrolling?

They do make a muddy mess, but I unroll it if possible in a fresh space and then they only trample around that area for a few hours. I am limited in where I can safely unroll so in a sense it is more or less sacrificing an area and in some places it is unrolled over the same area. I have found that years ago when I fed that way, my hay was just stored outside and then there would be the outside part that was not eaten, and then would just be a place for weeds to grow later in the summer. Now my hay is mostly stored inside and they are getting the benefit of the whole roll and not leaving it. I had wondered last year if would damage the ground but by summer it wasn't very noticeable at all, unless it was in a heavily used area.