Round bales of silage per acre

[Henarar]

How many bales per acre do you like to get ?

With our old pasture grass I like to get between 6 and 8 much more than that and the quality is not so good

 

[multi power]

Ten bales is what I call a good crop, about the right balance between bulk and quality
That would be good bales but soft centre 4 X 4

 

[Northeastfarmer]

Just made some yesterday, got 11 bales to the acre, as @multi power says, if we'd left it any longer you'd lose the quality in search of quantity

 

[Still Farming]

So many variations not easy to say.
Some balers pack more in.
Type of grass /dm wilt spec. etc etc
Big pinch of salt.
Usually 6 -12 ball park 4x4 rounds fixed chamber 1st cut June

 

[Poorbuthappy]

+1 to the variables.
Bales done in may could be from a pretty bulky sward without having headed much. Get into June or even July, even for a first cut its going to head before you get much bulk.

 

[Roy_H]

I well remember we bought a new JD 550 round baler ( Variable chamber, hard core) and the first time we ever baled silage with it was on a 60 acre field and by sheer coincidence we got 550 4' bales off it. You don't forget things like that !

 

[Lazy Eric]

I well remember we bought a new JD 550 round baler ( Variable chamber, hard core) and the first time we ever baled silage with it was on a 60 acre field and by sheer coincidence we got 550 4' bales off it. You don't forget things like that !

Sounds like a good crop and knowing the 550 we had they would be solid bales too! But by Christ they would have taken a while... Great hay and straw balers.... Grass ? [emoji33]

 

[Nithsdale]

Are you going for quality or sheer bulk?

We aim for 10/acre.

We have 2 very young leys which last year cropped 18/acre.

That's a McHale 5500 baler, and had a Class 255 before - both screwed up pretty tight. Claas was at Max, McHale not quite.

The baler before them, Krone KR125... we regularly took 20+/acre.

 

[Northeastfarmer]

Sounds like a good crop and knowing the 550 we had they would be solid bales too! But by Christ they would have taken a while... Great hay and straw balers.... Grass ? [emoji33]

We had a 550, then a 590...god the 590 was a bitch to start and as u say was an even bigger bitch in grass but made good solid hay and straw bales...anyway it did the honourable thing and burst into flames whilst bailing straw....currently running a 592 now, the improvement is unbelievable, it starts up full chat into a swath and makes really solid heavy bales...ill say in hay and straw nothing makes a more solid and well packed bale than it

 

[GTB]

We bought half a field of silage from our neighbour two years ago. He got about 15 bales to the acre with his old Vicon belt baler on his half. Our contractor got four to the acre with his fusion baler on the other half.

 

[Northeastfarmer]

We bought half a field of silage from our neighbour two years ago. He got about 15 bales to the acre with his old Vicon belt baler on his half. Our contractor got four to the acre with his fusion baler on the other half.

Sounds like the contractor wants to be buying himself an old vicon belt baler if he wants to be making any money

 

[GTB]

Sounds like the contractor wants to be buying himself an old vicon belt baler if he wants to be making any money

No, my neighbour needs to move with the times and scrap his old heap of shite and use the same contractor as we do!

 

[Ashtree]

Baled 10 acres last week of old grass meadow. Well fertilised and well wilted. 102 bales made with Krone Comprima. Solid bales showing zero effluent seepage after a week.
I was tempted to leave for another two weeks to get more bulk, but in the end I figured I might get 15% more bales and have no more actual feed in terms of DMD!

 

[William Mellor]

10 bales to the acre is a good crop here out of a mchale f550 baler after 24 hour wilt. I find if you don't leave to wilt you end up with soft bales that the wrapper just can't handle

 

[Henarar]

the most we have ever baled was 20 per acre with a belt baler and so hard it was a job to get the spike in them, what a load of rubbish it was but thankfully it wasn't ours

 

[M-J-G]

Due to variations in bales and conditions, I count more on DM/Ac for those who want belly fill or Mj/ac for those who want feed value, much more comparable than bale counts.

The highest I've achieved was 7.17 tonnes DM per acre, another higher feed value cut was 74355Mj/ac

 

[Grouse]

8 to 10 and I would be happy, any less and I'd feel cheated

 

[GTB]

I worked out many years ago that anything over 7 bales/acre would be cheaper to clamp it. Don't know if those figures still stand.

 

[Northeastfarmer]

I worked out many years ago that anything over 7 bales/acre would be cheaper to clamp it. Don't know if those figures still stand.

Would it not depend on total bales made?

 

[Henarar]

I worked out many years ago that anything over 7 bales/acre would be cheaper to clamp it. Don't know if those figures still stand.

not for me I have my own kit to do bales and no clamp