Hay preservative

[smcgrath76]

Sean where did you get that Gandy applicator? I'm not too far from you.

Got it from JSK Sales in Vermilion. I can get you a number if you want. They have put quite a few on and they need to wire up the tractor (to run the fan and metering setup).

[nicolaas]

12000 dollar chopper, 7500 dollar hi dump, and we already have the tractors for grain farming. It takes the custom guys 2 days it seems, though once out of 15 years they put up 1200 in one day. I still have to cover the stack, and still have to pack. It seems to be about 1500 dollars/year for repairs for the chopper. tank of fuel for the truck, 1/2 tank for the packing tractor, 3 for the chopper. It seems cheap for me. I don't pay my kids much. Doing my own for past 3 years, best silage I ever put up since you choose the time. If you are a mixed farm it makes more sense; straight cattle, more difficult to justify as you would not normally have a 4wd tractor with blade to pack.

[grassfarmer]

Thats why I like the high output custom versus smaller custom outfits - 1200tons is 6-6.5 hours work with no stoppages. We had a smaller outfit once - bigger than yours in equipment and it was moving less than 400 tons a day. I find that kind of custom guy hard to afford. Not as bad as the silage baling though. One guy that bales and wraps with the onboard wrapper I calculated his bill would have been exactly twice what my bill for the total job was using the big custom team - and I would still have had 1300 bales sitting out on the field to move! Yet they are busy too so some guys must like that system.

[smcgrath76]

12000 dollar chopper, 7500 dollar hi dump, and we already have the tractors for grain farming. It takes the custom guys 2 days it seems, though once out of 15 years they put up 1200 in one day. I still have to cover the stack, and still have to pack. It seems to be about 1500 dollars/year for repairs for the chopper. tank of fuel for the truck, 1/2 tank for the packing tractor, 3 for the chopper. It seems cheap for me. I don't pay my kids much. Doing my own for past 3 years, best silage I ever put up since you choose the time. If you are a mixed farm it makes more sense; straight cattle, more difficult to justify as you would not normally have a 4wd tractor with blade to pack.

Having a Grain enterprise and available labour makes a huge difference. We are basically a one used tractor, one person outfit (and I am not sure that isn't too much equipment when you just have cows). Your cost for do it yourself is very reasonable. For us the baler and discbine is a good, low cost risk management strategy. We have made a lot of feed available in years with poor growing conditions, simply by being able to cut/bale on shares or other arrangements. Without that basic lineup, we would have been pretty well stuck a few times. We use some custom labour/equipment (eg: corrn planting/spraying) but you always seem to be a touch out of perfect timing. Sometimes waiting doesn't matter, and sometimes it costs.

[greybeard]

Have used silage in the past but as Sean says it's not really suited to cowboys unless you can get some sort of cooperative deal going.
Do you think Corn may not be so time sensitive?
I use a lot of grass seed aftermath. It varies from good calf starter to good windbreak.
Utilization is a lot better if you can mix it with highly palatable silage.
All kinds of opportunity feeds with silage in a TMR.