Silage Hay

[CAH2873]

Hello,

I have 90 acres in 2 locations that are and have been ready to cut and bale for the past several weeks. Due to the recent rains, my hay guy has not been able to get it done. He is cutting today and hopefully will be rolling dry hay on Tuesday before the next big chance of rain. We live in East Texas and it typically takes 5-6 day of good sunlight to dry out the thick coastal fields along with teddering it this time of year.
He has suggested that if it does not get dry enough, to wrap it in baleage. I do not have a problem with this- never have sold or fed any- but I do not have a good way of loading and unloading it without puncturing the bag with my forks. I sell most of the hay to various customers and have to load it onto their trailers. I have looked at bale handers for the front of my Kubota- I do have a 3rd function on the front of it.
Does anyone recommend a good cheap bale handler for this situation?

Can one put holes in the bags then cover them up?

Thanks in Advance.

 

[Tx Jim]

I've read there a special type of tape available to cover puncture holes on the baleage wrapping. Do you have a good market for high moisture wrapped rd bales?

 

[CAH2873]

It is gaining popularity around here due to protein content and cows eating 100% of it. All of the custom balers have silage equipment now.

 

[LouNY]

The squeeze grapples are the only way to handle wrapped bales, if punctured it would be difficult to seal the hole and tear with tape.
Once those bales cook up it is very difficult to move them without tearing the wrap. They almost have to be stacked as they are wrapped and then left alone till time to feed them.
Depending on the haylage and number of cows being feed and the climate the feed will be good for 2-4 days.

 

[CAH2873]

The squeeze grapples are the only way to handle wrapped bales, if punctured it would be difficult to seal the hole and tear with tape.
Once those bales cook up it is very difficult to move them without tearing the wrap. They almost have to be stacked as they are wrapped and then left alone till time to feed them.
Depending on the haylage and number of cows being feed and the climate the feed will be good for 2-4 days.

I see several types of squeeze grapples. Do you have one that you recommend?

 

[CAH2873]

The squeeze grapples are the only way to handle wrapped bales, if punctured it would be difficult to seal the hole and tear with tape.
Once those bales cook up it is very difficult to move them without tearing the wrap. They almost have to be stacked as they are wrapped and then left alone till time to feed them.
Depending on the haylage and number of cows being feed and the climate the feed will be good for 2-4 days.

I see several types of squeeze grapples. Do you have one that you recommend?

 

[Agvg]

This is the way they are handled here

 

[cqaigy2]

Hey silage is pretty common here because of the rain. They don't typically puncture them unless going to feed, because of the difficulty patching.

 

[jaxs]

If your buyers put bales end to end in a row that suffeciently seal's holes left by spears.

 

[LouNY]

I see several types of squeeze grapples. Do you have one that you recommend?

The style that Agvg is the type that we use, it's curved squeeze grapple for round bales, I havn't seen them called anything else.
As far as a brand most of them don't seem to branded more small shop put outs.

I don't believe that baleage could be stacked tight enough to seal spear holes and tears.

Also we have found that net wrapped bales are much easier to get a good wrap on, twine tyed bales tend to have too many stems perturbing that will perforate the wrap film.


Also animals are a constant hazard, mice, rats tunnel under and into the bales allowing air to enter and cause rot and ruined feed.
Turkeys can get up on them to roost and tear the wrapping.

Although a lot can go wrong when done successfully you will have good quality highly digestible feed put up.
We have a couple hundred bales of wrapped haylage bales and a few thousand tons of ag bagged hay and corn silage that gets feed out every year.