john432
Member
- Location
- Carmarthenshire
Has any one any experience of baling fresh barley straw after combining the grain for crimmping? Was thinking it would be an OK feed for suckler cows, and not so weather dependant,thanks John
Baling and wrapping greenish straw?
- Thread starter john432
- Start date
- Location
- Ashbourne, Derbyshire
I reckon it would go mouldy
john432
Member
- Location
- Carmarthenshire
My worries would be damage to the wrap on falling off the wrapper onto the stubble. so maybe move to a grass field before wrapping, would mould be any different to haylage bales?
- Location
- Huntingdon
- Location
- Devon
Yea, we had some here one stage for the cattle over the winter. They were mouldy, steaming jot and turnt brown on the inside.
And they way I've seen it dond do you don't damage them on stubble etc, was the baler chap was towing a carpet behind wrapper so the initial hit wasn't straight onto stubble, it just rolled onto it.
Chae1
Member
- Location
- Aberdeenshire
I would treat it with ammonia if wrapping straw like that. However bale undersown barley hard behind combine and wrap for feed and keeps fine. so might get off with it.
Farmer Dod
Member
- Location
- Aberdeenshire
We tried wrapping some grassier straw bales last year. Some were okay but good few went mouldy.
M-J-G
Member
There has to be sugar present for it to ferment. So if it's grassy or really green you have a chance. The more it looks like straw the more likely it is to go mouldy.
landslave the 2nd
Member
- Location
- near the zoo (m42 j11) east mids
did 60 oat straw last year.......4ft put 6x plastic, 650kg ,suck cows loved them,but did get 10% go bad with stubble holes
I wonder if applying molasses as its baled would help?
M-J-G
Member
It would do, might be messy though!
holywell farmer
Member
- Location
- holywell, north wales
in wet summer of 2012 my uncle had a lad in to wrap around 25 bales of winter barley staw and they were fine when they were fed during the winter,
john432
Member
- Location
- Carmarthenshire
Just an update, I combined my spring barley and crimped and ensiled the grain. Contractor came first thing in the morning to bale and wrap,yes 6 layers. a bit of dew on the straw didn't do any harm,and it suited him to start early as his silage customers wanted to bale from mid day onwards. Mc Hale baler picking up straight from the 10 foot combine swath meant the bales were rock hard. The barley stubble didn't cut the wrap as the bales were tipped, seems to get sharp after a few days though. Crows was the biggest problem,with the bales lying in the field. Been feeding it to my cattle,and am well pleased, quite a bit of grain in the bales, that would have been lost if I had tedded and rowed up the straw to dry it,allong with most of the fine chaff and awns. To date one bale was about a third mouldy,due to damaged wrap. some have small patches of mould on the outside, most are perfect. I will be doing it again
Wolds farmers
Member
Wrapped just under 300 winter barley bales after crimping with the grain at about 45% moisture, as an experiment. Only put four layers on. I am feeding them to finishing cattle as roughage alongside the crimped barley fed ad-lib. Hasn't gone particularly mouldy, no problem on that front. But am also bedding them with crimped barley straw that we dried out etc and baled dry. They love eating that off the floor, so don't really eat any of the moist straw until they are quite dirty. Which means it may take 4 or 5 days for them to polish a bale in the ring feeder off, which in the mean time has gone hot, and then needs forking out! Don't reckon we will do any more next year. But if I was feeding them too suckler cows that ate for the fun of it all day I might!!
Wolds farmers
Member
Forgot to say had it analysed and came out at 33% DM and 5.3% CP. Don't really know what's normal for straw though!!