Hay Silage

[ERNIBIGB]

The hay ring on the left is good Bermuda grass hay.The one they are attacking is ryegrass/crimson clover silage. They will eat every straw of the silage, no waste at all. Also using it as creep feed for calves. Still new to the hay silage and invite comments from other users.

 

[dun]

Cows seem to think that fermented(ensiled) stuff is beer!

 

[Stocker Steve]

It takes a lot of equipment, and thus a lot of $, to make and store and feed silage. That is part of the reason you see so many empty silos in dairy country. I just bought 2 used uprights (with the farm) and I need to deal with them.

The only reasons I can think of for a beef guy to make grass silage are:
- too wet to make hay, and can not afford to mob it onto the ground
- need higher energy feed for grass finishing

 

[ERNIBIGB]

Only new (used) piece of equipment here is the wrapper.
Ryegrass is easy to grow and doesn't require much fertilizer.
Put up some sorghum/sudan that was cut baled and wrapped same day.(drying weather that day).
Putting silage in a silo would be expensive. I think a lot of the dairy folks are just wrapping round bales now instead.

 

[Angus Cowman]

i posted earlier but it seems to have got lost
Sileage is like crack for cows once they get a taste they will kill ya for it

when I was feeding with dew eze beds they would lick the bed trying to get the last bit of juice off of it
I was wondering how your sileage baling went
We sold almost all of ours about all we have for ourselves is some that got holes tore in it and wasn't the best of quality but it will work fine in our TMR

 

[TexasBred]

Only new (used) piece of equipment here is the wrapper.
Ryegrass is easy to grow and doesn't require much fertilizer.
Put up some sorghum/sudan that was cut baled and wrapped same day.(drying weather that day).
Putting silage in a silo would be expensive. I think a lot of the dairy folks are just wrapping round bales now instead.

Most around this are simply put silage in a bunker silo cut into the side of a hill or just back it on top of the gorund with concrete walls on the side. Hire someone to come in and cut, haul and pack it. Putting grass up in bales takes a lot of expensive equipment too. Most balers won't bale it, then you ahve the wrapper and cutter and sometimes will have 3 tractors involved, cuttting, baling and hauling to the wrapper. But as you point out cattle do love it.

 

[regolith]

As a minimum you need the mower, baler and a tractor with spike to grab the bale. Put it into a big plastic bag while it's on the spike, then stack the bale and tie off the bag - won't give the best result but saves the cost of wrap and wrapper. Tube wrapping is another way of saving on wrap. Most hire it done here also.

From what I've seen in this country, baled and wrapped silage is much more consistent than silage made in a pit or stack. I think it takes a bit of experience to get a stack right.

 

[ERNIBIGB]

I am still learning. If you look close some of the bales are not evenly shaped. This will cause a small air pocket resulting in a small amount of white mold. It is minimal but if I do a better job of making the bales uniform this should not happen. This run was the first I tried and did do better with later baling.