Sugar beet tops

[holywell farmer]

is true in 60s it was popular for silage

 

[landslave the 2nd]

Believe so, think almer salmon (spell ) beet harvesters did a version that put tops into a separate hopper to tip into trailer

 

[Chae1]

I heard there ok feed.

 

[holywell farmer]

I heard there ok feed.

Assume you could wilt the tops

 

[Dkb]

I know of 2 seperate people that did it once each.

Don’t know of success or results only that neither of them repeated

 

[spin cycle]

problem would be if wilted they would get soil contamination.....standen did a three row top saver with a version that'd load onto a trailer

trouble was i think it slowed down the beet harvesting

beet tops great for sheep folding but modern beet harvesters pulverise the tops to nothing

 

[holywell farmer]

problem would be if wilted they would get soil contamination.....standen did a three row top saver with a version that'd load onto a trailer

trouble was i think it slowed down the beet harvesting

beet tops great for sheep folding but modern beet harvesters pulverise the tops to nothing

Was it easy to clamp

 

[spin cycle]

Was it easy to clamp

never saw any so don't know....ctm made a simple trailed loader that you towed and it put tops onto another trailer beside....these were quite popular because you could wilt the tops then go and get a load to feed when you needed them

i used to row up tops with a vicon acrobat....load with a ctm....park the trailer in the grass field with the sheep and fork some off every day

 

[Derrick Hughes]

Graze the tops before you harvest the roots .lambs wont touch the roots much until tops have gone

 

[neilo]

problem would be if wilted they would get soil contamination.....standen did a three row top saver with a version that'd load onto a trailer

trouble was i think it slowed down the beet harvesting

beet tops great for sheep folding but modern beet harvesters pulverise the tops to nothing

My lifting contractor was telling me about one place locally where they lifted the topper out of the way, lifting tops & roots together. I guess if you’re feeding it fairly quickly it could work OK, but would maybe heat quickly in a clamp?

 

[MJT]

Hate the modern harvesters that decimate the tops,use our own armer salmon here and strip graze tops with in lamb ewes or fattening hoggs , they do bloody well on it, and there’s a serious amount of feed.

 

[holywell farmer]

Hate the modern harvesters that decimate the tops,use our own armer salmon here and strip graze tops with in lamb ewes or fattening hoggs , they do bloody well on it, and there’s a serious amount of feed.

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In the old days it would been case of a couple farmer workers pitch forking the crop into trailers !

 

[holywell farmer]

My lifting contractor was telling me about one place locally where they lifted the topper out of the way, lifting tops & roots together. I guess if you’re feeding it fairly quickly it could work OK, but would maybe heat quickly in a clamp?

Would put additive on the leaves

 

[holywell farmer]

I heard there ok feed.

Could mix fooder beet in a maize clamp ?

 

[Exfarmer]

Never heard of tops being put into silage, suspect far too much soil contamination. The real value in the tops is not the leaf anyway, it is is the actual top of the root above the leaf line which has the feed value.
Tops used to be collected after wilting, neccessary as fresh tops are poisonous due to Oxalic axid, and fed to youngstock or cows

 

[spin cycle]

look on youtube for kiwis harvesting beet with special loader buckets.....these must be fed fresh

 

[hollister]

That's fodder beet I believe?

 

[mixed breed]

Never seen ensiled, but I do remember the early 80s, father running a side mounted single chop forager on mf165. He would drive up and down the sugar beet openings blowing the leaves of 3? rows into a jf feeder wagon, then charging home to feed them to the cows.

Apparently the cows milked well on them, but you had to be carefull as you could easily overdo them and make them ill

 

[Exfarmer]

We lost several cows at college , when they got in a field of beet and grazed the tops.
They should be wilted 48 hours to be safe, I believe.

 

[steveR]

problem would be if wilted they would get soil contamination.....standen did a three row top saver with a version that'd load onto a trailer

trouble was i think it slowed down the beet harvesting

beet tops great for sheep folding but modern beet harvesters pulverise the tops to nothing

Spot on, I found that once I moved to a 6 row machine for harvesting rather than the Standen 1-2 tow machines, the amount left for feed was hardly worth the effort other than the roots left behind.

My Uncle told me of a failed attempt to make silage in the 60's locally, but they never bothered ;-)