Silage question

D&amp;C Farm · Aug 9, 2016

Just started chopping silage 3 years ago and have always been able to get done in a day without rain help is a little iffy this year chance of rain every day putting silage in a bunk will a rain hurt it before I get it covered with plastic

donjr · Aug 9, 2016

Won't hurt it- may even help it. Between days, you may get a bit of rot, but it's not too bad. They'll still clean it up....

Donald Lehman · Aug 9, 2016

Nope won't hurt it.

jeffcat · Aug 9, 2016

Sure the wetter the better. When I was a kid and we were putting up silage I can remember that sorgum was all the rage. Real wet summer and when that stuff was in the silo water was squirting out from between the tile blocks! Water running down the sides of the silos. The drains around the silo were like a little river of juice going down the drain. Smelled like a beer factory. NOW there was a side benny to all of this. Couple of weeks later when the weather changed and dried up you could find night crawlers in the soil around the silos. They were HUGE!! Like 10 or 12 inches long and almost the diameter of a BIC pen. Looked like small brown snakes. Fish thought they were pretty good to. Most important thing with silage is a good seal. The better the seal the less spoilage. They used to have something in bags you tossed into the silo blower as you were filling. I suspect it was citric acid to boost the PH level. Less spoilage.

farmerwithmutt · Aug 9, 2016

Heck I can remember open top silos that
were never covered. A lot of people add
water to silage . One year we put in
sorghum that ran for a couple days and we
had one idiot of a cow that liked to lay
in it problem was we hand milked you were
a little wobbly after milking her.
Don't forget to put the jug at the bottom
next year you might have all kinds of
volunteers

Dick2 · Aug 9, 2016

When the juice started leaking out of the neighbor's upright silo, we used to go over and watch the pigs drinking that juice. That is a real circus watching how a drunken pig acts. They tend to just move around a little, but squealing all the time like they've got a laughing jag on!

coonie minnie · Aug 9, 2016

It'll hurt it. There are guys that cover the pile even if just a chance of rain, even if they are not done. Do what you can to get done and covered before rain. Too
wet will make for a nasty, butyric fermentation cattle won't like to eat. Many a bunk silo has a nasty slime layer midway through where they got held up by rain for a
few days.

BarnyardEngineering · Aug 9, 2016

Yeah but only that layer is "ruined" and that's why mixer wagons were invented. Throw enough good feed and grain in with it and the cows won't know the difference.

coonie minnie · Aug 9, 2016

Mixer wagons are to combine good ingredients together into something called a total mixed ration. They are not to disguise crap feed.

notjustair · Aug 9, 2016

Our trench silo was never covered, either. There was a layer about 8 inches thick that was waste but we threw that in the bunks, too. I thought it was odd the first time saw a trench silo with a cover and old tires on it!

47fivewindow · Aug 9, 2016

Boar hog with a hangover? Talk about bad attitude.

Silage question

D&C Farm

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donjr

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Donald Lehman

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jeffcat

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farmerwithmutt

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Dick2

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coonie minnie

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BarnyardEngineering

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coonie minnie

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notjustair

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47fivewindow

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