Round bales or silage pit?

[glasshouse]

Concrete panel walls without a sheet 3 artics of citrus pulp on top of each clamp. Zero plastic

So the rain gets in?

 

[tr250]

So the rain gets in?

Yes it does but doesn’t seem to effect it too much this probably went in at 30%+ Dm. The wet isn’t too much of an issue as we mix with dry feeds but is probably too wet to feed alone 2nd cut btw

 

[Monty]

Why would a clamp be I pile of crap? It’s easy to make it a pile of crap the same way you can leave bale for the crows to get or let cattle to it and they make holes in every one. The loss of the trailed forager and self propelled gangs putting too much in a clamp without consolidating has probably made this myth

I've seen plenty of clamps with 6 inches to a foot of waste round the edges.

A few small pecked holes in a bale tend not to be much of an issue, a hole causes about 6 inches of rotten crap in the area and it takes a huge tear in the top of an exposed bale to leave it inedible. Small holes don't let much rain into a round bale as it mainly runs off. Square bales tend to not to keep as well for this reason, water sits on top then runs into the bale rather than off.

 

[Chae1]

We did our bale costs at half of seed cost, fertilizer, wrap, baled, stack, haul, mowed, ted, raked and it was £15.13 per bale.
I calculated the mowing, raking and tedding of the tractor hours plus one tenth of the purchase of the machine, checking this with Nix I found it to be only a couple pounds an acre at most from farmers costs they had listed. Since I would keep the tractor, mower, tedder, rake and wrapper etc for 2nd and subsequent cuts the expense of a silage pit would be prohibitive and increase the fixed costs significantly, it would have to be roofed as I have no slurry or dirty water system.

At last someones included establishment cost of grass too! If this is divided by number of years ley down its not a small figure.

Obviously nobody puts on any lime either.

Does anyone speak to waste disposal company about what they do with waste plastic? I know ours goes to landfill.

As said above be better to burn it and utilise heat energy.

 

[beefandsleep]

I don’t know what the problem is with plastic to be honest if disposed of properly. Bale it, bury it, carbon stored. If somewhere down the line it becomes worth recycling it can be dug up, it could end up being a valuable resource.

 

[Poorbuthappy]

I don’t know what the problem is with plastic to be honest if disposed of properly. Bale it, bury it, carbon stored. If somewhere down the line it becomes worth recycling it can be dug up, it could end up being a valuable resource.

The fact that it's fueling an unsustainable demand for fossil fuels?

 

[jamesy]

At last someones included establishment cost of grass too! If this is divided by number of years ley down its not a small figure.

Obviously nobody puts on any lime either.

Does anyone speak to waste disposal company about what they do with waste plastic? I know ours goes to landfill.

As said above be better to burn it and utilise heat energy.

I’ve a commercial bin from council for my plastic. Rubbish from here goes to Shetland where they burn it to produce heating for houses in Lerwick I believe.

 

[jamesy]

Shetland Heat Energy & Power (SHEAP)

www.sheap-ltd.co.uk

 

[beefandsleep]

The fact that it's fueling an unsustainable demand for fossil fuels?

When the alternatives become cheaper then they will be used instead. Using oil to make plastic has to be the least harmful exploitation of a finite resource if it is disposed of properly as the carbon is not recycled back into the atmosphere.