Anyone ever wrapped bales of hay?

Limestone Cowboy

Thinking about this today, plenty of hay around going cheap at the moment but have no shed to put it in. Suits us with out wintering and environmental scheme were in. Would it go mouldy if it was wrapped and stacked outside or has anyone ever tried it?

tanko

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Thinking about this today, plenty of hay around going cheap at the moment but have no shed to put it in. Suits us with out wintering and environmental scheme were in. Would it go mouldy if it was wrapped and stacked outside or has anyone ever tried it?

I had a field of rough silage last year. I cut it and rowed it up without turning it. The contractor didn't come for five days due to a family death. Weather was very hot at the time and the stuff was hay by the time it was baled and wrapped.
However, the outside nine inches of the bales went mouldy.

Would you consider putting the bales on pallets and throwing a tarpaulin over them?

cristeoir

Know a man who done it with straw, he wrapped as normal and then cut out both ends to prevent it sweating and going mouldy, it worked the finest but it wouldn't be the cheapest way out.

joejobrien

i know a lad that wraps them (straw)every year and tells me that it does work well. havent seen it unsure about hay

Charliebull

tanko wrote: »

I had a field of rough silage last year. I cut it and rowed it up without turning it. The contractor didn't come for five days due to a family death. Weather was very hot at the time and the stuff was hay by the time it was baled and wrapped.
However, the outside nine inches of the bales went mouldy.

Would you consider putting the bales on pallets and throwing a tarpaulin over them?

id say the same thing, we used to make large pikes of hay in a corner of a field many moons ago and they used to survive that way

Limestone Cowboy

tanko wrote: »

I had a field of rough silage last year. I cut it and rowed it up without turning it. The contractor didn't come for five days due to a family death. Weather was very hot at the time and the stuff was hay by the time it was baled and wrapped.
However, the outside nine inches of the bales went mouldy.

Would you consider putting the bales on pallets and throwing a tarpaulin over them?

I could do that but I don't have near enough pallets or a tarp and to be honest if I thought it would work wrapping them would be a lot handier and tidier looking. Often wrapped straw for lads when working with contractor but hay is a different kettle of fish. I'd be talking about stuff that's seasoned for a few months too and not baled fresh so should be no heating

epfff

Have done straw works well but expensive
Hay needs to breath as far as I know

Charliebull

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

I could do that but I don't have near enough pallets or a tarp and to be honest if I thought it would work wrapping them would be a lot handier and tidier looking. Often wrapped straw for lads when working with contractor but hay is a different kettle of fish. I'd be talking about stuff that's seasoned for a few months too and not baled fresh so should be no heating

how long will they be out for, could you double stack with what you intend to feed first on top, seen lads fire mounds rushes on top of hay to keep water off, not sure of the success rate but:D

Limestone Cowboy

Start feeding at Christmas to April I guess, I'll give the contractor a shout in the evening and see what he thinks. Was thinking hay would need to breath alright. Have free access to a wrapper so it only the cost of plastic really.

Dublin Red Devil

It depends on the moisture content if the grass. If hay is dry enough, wrap is a waste of money.

You can wrap dry sillage called Haylage
but it doesn't keep as well as ordinary sillage bales

Limestone Cowboy

Dublin Red Devil wrote: »

It depends on the moisture content if the grass. If hay is dry enough, wrap is a waste of money.

You can wrap dry sillage called Haylage
but it doesn't keep as well as ordinary sillage bales

I know that but I don't have space in a shed to put it into and wrapping them is the next option, if the are going to turn into bales of mould then it's a waste of time!

Dublin Red Devil

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

I know that but I don't have space in a shed to put it into and wrapping them is the next option, if the are going to turn into bales of mould then it's a waste of time!

if they have been made and unwraped for any amount of time I wouldn't go wrapping them now. Not sure exactly what would happen but Its not something thats done, at least in the Roscommon area anyway.

You could try to sell it as hay and then buy sillage bales but because of the good growth this summer the market is flooded. might be difficult to sell

J.O. Farmer

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

I could do that but I don't have near enough pallets or a tarp and to be honest if I thought it would work wrapping them would be a lot handier and tidier looking. Often wrapped straw for lads when working with contractor but hay is a different kettle of fish. I'd be talking about stuff that's seasoned for a few months too and not baled fresh so should be no heating

If you have a way of stacking them I think you would be cheaper buying a silage cover and pallets. They can be reused over a number of years and bales neatly stacked will be quite neat. You can go about 3 high and keep the top a bit narrower and the rain will flow off the cover.
Haylage will keep the finest but I think it tends to need double the amount of wrap. Not sure about seasoned hay though.
If I'm reading it right your hoping to buy hay. By the time you buy the hay and pay for wrapping it you'll be looking at €40-50 for a bale of fodder. There's lots of silage that will be just as good or better at €25. It's a big difference in price.

Pacoa

We'll I've just warped hay and straw today so I can let yee know how it gets on. Have had the hay under a sheet of plastic and on plattets the last two months. It does'nt work. Wind blows it off and it gets damp underneath aswell.

Limestone Cowboy

J.O. Farmer wrote: »

If you have a way of stacking them I think you would be cheaper buying a silage cover and pallets. They can be reused over a number of years and bales neatly stacked will be quite neat. You can go about 3 high and keep the top a bit narrower and the rain will flow off the cover.
Haylage will keep the finest but I think it tends to need double the amount of wrap. Not sure about seasoned hay though.
If I'm reading it right your hoping to buy hay. By the time you buy the hay and pay for wrapping it you'll be looking at €40-50 for a bale of fodder. There's lots of silage that will be just as good or better at €25. It's a big difference in price.

Can get 60 bales of hay delivered for 30e a bale. Spent 5 years working with contractor and still help him out when he's stuck so he'll give me the tractor and wrapper for an hour if I want it. There's plenty of silage around for 25 alright but with the envirometal scheme were in here I'm going to lose out on over 2k if I feed it on the winterage but no problem with hay so I'm kinda caught that way too. Would be grand if the storms last year hadn't brought down the shed

Limestone Cowboy

Pacoa wrote: »

We'll I've just warped hay and straw today so I can let yee know how it gets on. Have had the hay under a sheet of plastic and on plattets the last two months. It does'nt work. Wind blows it off and it gets damp underneath aswell.

Very exposed here and right on the coast aswell which is putting me off covering it a bit.

J.O. Farmer

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Can get 60 bales of hay delivered for 30e a bale. Spent 5 years working with contractor and still help him out when he's stuck so he'll give me the tractor and wrapper for an hour if I want it. There's plenty of silage around for 25 alright but with the envirometal scheme were in here I'm going to lose out on over 2k if I feed it on the winterage but no problem with hay so I'm kinda caught that way too. Would be grand if the storms last year hadn't brought down the shed

Isn't it great that some genius in an office thinks that the silage will be that much worse for the environment.
I'd say it will cost about €5 a bale for the plastic and whatever it costs you to wrap them with access to a wrapper. €30 delivered is good. I would have been pricing at at least that plus delivery.
If you do wrap though I'd say an extra bit of plastic all round could help with a better seal and less chance of getting mouldy.

Nekarsulm

I haven't seen any bales made with the plastic film in place of the netting yet.
Two questions, 1) Can you use it for hay, or would the hay heat, and
2) If you do bale very dry hay and all goes well, will the film mean that the bales are now weather proof?

I was in France lately, and saw quite a few places with the silage bales wrapped with one of those "tubeline" wrappers. 100 yard long caterpillars of silage along the back of the ditch.

Limestone Cowboy

J.O. Farmer wrote: »

Isn't it great that some genius in an office thinks that the silage will be that much worse for the environment.
I'd say it will cost about €5 a bale for the plastic and whatever it costs you to wrap them with access to a wrapper. €30 delivered is good. I would have been pricing at at least that plus delivery.
If you do wrap though I'd say an extra bit of plastic all round could help with a better seal and less chance of getting mouldy.

Well in fairness I signed up to the scheme and while I'm not baned from feeding silage they don't want it and will cut the money if I do which is fair enough to be honest. Was a lot of sh1t ending up in watercourses when everyone around was using ring feeders and silage. Almost a thing of the past now.

Zr105

Nekarsulm wrote: »

I haven't seen any bales made with the plastic film in place of the netting yet.
Two questions, 1) Can you use it for hay, or would the hay heat, and
2) If you do bale very dry hay and all goes well, will the film mean that the bales are now weather proof?

I was in France lately, and saw quite a few places with the silage bales wrapped with one of those "tubeline" wrappers. 100 yard long caterpillars of silage along the back of the ditch.

I dont think the plastic film instead of net can be used if their not being wrapped. I dont think its strong enough. It wont work in a standard netwrap unit either, and i think its only combi balers(krone and mchale) that are bring sold so far with a better unit hat can handle it.

Net wrap does a fair job of weather proofing bales in fairness, but it's the ends thats the problem..

einn32

Got a wrapped bale if straw here last winter. Some was rotten and the rest was damp/mouldy.

foxy farmer

tanko wrote: »

I had a field of rough silage last year. I cut it and rowed it up without turning it. The contractor didn't come for five days due to a family death. Weather was very hot at the time and the stuff was hay by the time it was baled and wrapped.
However, the outside nine inches of the bales went mouldy.

Would you consider putting the bales on pallets and throwing a tarpaulin over them?

Did this exactly about 10 years ago. A dead loss for several reasons. Needed hayshed for extra cattle. Stacked over 100 4x4 rounds in triangle formation 4 high on pallets and covered with one of them blue woven covers weigh down with tyres and rope over the stack with 5 gallon drums tied at the ends. The stack was on the eastern side of a slatted house so was sheltered or so I thought. Problems trying to keep tarp from tearing from day one. Put silage cover over it after a month. Condensation dripping off the plastic eventually destroyed the bales. Pallets went to brus from being on damp ground and the rats were another problem. By the time I got to the end of the stack the bales were dung. Put up a shed the following year.A lesson hard learned.

Genghis Cant

We stacked bales of hay outside one winter when we were stuck for space.
There's surprisingly little waste on them. Stack them in rows, end to end tight together, but space between the rows for the rain to run off.

Good loser

Genghis Cant wrote: »

We stacked bales of hay outside one winter when we were stuck for space.
There's surprisingly little waste on them. Stack them in rows, end to end tight together, but space between the rows for the rain to run off.

That's the thing to do OP.

Markcheese

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyTqsxQtmkE&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Absolutely no use to the op but just saw this on you tube ,

sandydan

few years ago i baled hay bb and left it in field, some on pallets, outside went black but all was eaten, few i had no pallets for i placed on stones that were thrown against ditch almost perfect, it was twine wrapped and that was only bad bits but overall id say if square baled and some on outside of shed id have as much waste,some one said if placed on gravel or sand its fine too , i dont know. i know fellas stacking bales of straw on end on pallets on ground in sheltery spot, stacking 2 or 3 high with top of bale covered in plastic secured with tape or whatever, doing for last few years,
however one thing i do know is last years silage was gone too long without cutting,(due to bad year 1st cut silage not put into pits ,so contractor had loads of new customers)silage gone into hay some would say, and i had a lot of mouldy bales. if min wrap was used,( say about 35 bales or more to roll) and ends cut off would it have preserved as hay ,due to less plastic to prevent breathing i wonder

Markcheese

Pity you can't alter a wrapper to just do the round of the bale (ie not the ends) then place them nearly edge to edge...

Zr105

sandydan wrote: »

few years ago i baled hay bb and left it in field, some on pallets, outside went black but all was eaten, few i had no pallets for i placed on stones that were thrown against ditch almost perfect, it was twine wrapped and that was only bad bits but overall id say if square baled and some on outside of shed id have as much waste,some one said if placed on gravel or sand its fine too , i dont know. i know fellas stacking bales of straw on end on pallets on ground in sheltery spot, stacking 2 or 3 high with top of bale covered in plastic secured with tape or whatever, doing for last few years,
however one thing i do know is last years silage was gone too long without cutting,(due to bad year 1st cut silage not put into pits ,so contractor had loads of new customers)silage gone into hay some would say, and i had a lot of mouldy bales. if min wrap was used,( say about 35 bales or more to roll) and ends cut off would it have preserved as hay ,due to less plastic to prevent breathing i wonder

There's no point trying to stretch wrap to get 35 to a roll, it doesn't work like that! That would give you something like 2 layers and then 2 half layers.

sandydan

Zr105 wrote: »

There's no point trying to stretch wrap to get 35 to a roll, it doesn't work like that! That would give you something like 2 layers and then 2 half layers.

not to produce silage anyway, i understand the layers of polythene prevent breathing resulting in mould, around 20 bales per roll is heavy wrapping , around 28-30 approx is regarded as min when wrapping bales of silage.
we are talking of just providing waterproof cover for hay bales not silage, here as well as reducing cost of doing so,if plastic wrapping was reduced to 2 layers or less ,
could/ would this 2 layers of wrap on bale of dry hay with ends cut off give "weather or rain protection" without creating risk of mouldy bales

Zr105

sandydan wrote: »

not to produce silage anyway, i understand the layers of polythene prevent breathing resulting in mould, around 20 bales per roll is heavy wrapping , around 28-30 approx is regarded as min when wrapping bales of silage.
we are talking of just providing waterproof cover for hay bales not silage, here as well as reducing cost of doing so,if plastic wrapping was reduced to 2 layers or less ,
could/ would this 2 layers of wrap on bale of dry hay with ends cut off give "weather or rain protection" without creating risk of mouldy bales

I dont think so as at 2 layers if you cut the ends off the bit around the circumference would just fall apart, anything under the normal 4layers is very very flimsy

sandydan

Zr105 wrote: »

I dont think so as at 2 layers if you cut the ends off the bit around the circumference would just fall apart, anything under the normal 4layers is very very flimsy

ya stands to reason , wrap and hay dont mix i guess,