Tedding/wuffling silage

intresting thread, we do all bales nowadays. they are great but expensive. we have a silage pit but its now used as a bale/machinery shed and also for housing cattle. plus id be wary puttign in those big loadrs into it noawadays.

have been lookign to find a way to reuce cost of silage with out reducing quality. its all contract work here, mower conditoner, draw witha keltec, wrap and stack with a teleporter. i wont be moving from teh existign wrapper stacker unit as is means teh plastic gets minium handlign and as we have the bales on a hardcore base less likely to get punctered. drawing them in with a bale handler or spike on teh tractor takes too much time an you juct end up leaving tracks on the fields, i still do it for small cuts on paddocks near wher im stacking but wouldnt for the main cut. usign a bale trailer takes twice to 3 times the lenght of time of teh keltec.

I dont have me own mower but the idea is rattling around in my head to get maybe a 8ft disc mower that i can also use for topping (topper died about 2 years ago). i get the contractor to mow in single swarths and let it down for a day to wilt. usually the silage is good an wilted but not too dry and it perserves well. so the idea of tedding it out and then rowing it back in would be very new to me. If i was to get teh mower then i'd need to get a tedder/rower as well. i'm just wondering if the expense of teh machine and the extra time needed (3 runs, mower, tedding, rowing) would be better then a single 10ft run witha mower conditor?

we made haylage 3 years ago, mowed on a friday (lad mowing came a day early) but contractor wasnt able ot get to us until monday (came a day late). sialge was very dry and wasnt as good as the earlier stuff that was only wilted for about 36hrs.

i think silage can be too dry

Costing me 15 euros a bale from knocking stacking inc plastic. Working away from farm today. Will be all done when I get home. Only sweat I'll break is signing the cheque afterwards. Still think its worth it.

Haven't read all the posts been too busy baling grass

we mow, row and bale, draw and stack , job done

not a fan of leaving grass more than 1 night on the ground

not a fan of high N usage like some of the posters here

mowed monday evening, threw it into 25 foot rows last evening and & started baling at 10 am this morn ............ yes I know 2 nights on the ground but what can you do, .. 1 fellow hung over after Miss Macra in south tipp and another after a wedding in belfast , but at least they eventually arrived home safely

got 175 bales to day looks ok

I don't think I will change my system ,.... light cuts , little and often
keep the labour & machinery to a minimun

one thing about bales whether they are wet or dry , have enough of them and you will be ok

We'd make 500 -700 bales pa. Used to do pit however base need to be resurfaced and we got scalded a few years with contractor coming in wet weather ploughing up fields etc.

We always ted the grass and I agree with relig - you will get at least 2 bales less per acre.

Usually contractor cuts with his 10ft mow co. If he is mad busy we can cut ourselves with 8ft std disk mower. Contractor charges €1.50 per bale for cutting so @ circa €15/acre hardly worth mowing ourselves.

We ted / row with a pz haybob driven by MF 35x with some simple modifications;

Firstly I drilled a few extra holes along the gates so I can vary the width of the rows. This allows me spread the row from the mow co out over 7 - 8 ft if I want, and re- row back to the same width as the mow co did originally. (A normal haybob row is narrower)

Second I always ted and row the grass with the tines set to ted. When tines are set to row, the hay bob tends to leave the grass piled high in the middle of the row and leads to bales with poor shoulders. When set to ted the grass is scattered evenly over the width of the row.

Thirdly how you drive is critical - no need to over rev as leads to lumping. Always drive to ensure that each rotor is catching the same amount of grass. If one rotor is catching more grass than the other it throws the grass back heavier on one side or the row than the other leading to uneven rows and slopey bales. I always try to ensure that the 1 mow co row is tedded out and goes back into the same row thus ensuring even rows as much as possible.

Depending on drying conditions, we might ted the row out over an 8ft width and re - row back the following day. If conditions are very good we just run along the rows and row at normal width for baling -similar to a wuffler.

I attach some photo's below taken this year as I had it in my mind to post the above earlier but never got around to it. Anyway might be of some use for next year.

Photo 1 shows the extra holes drilled in the gates
Photo 2 shows a row on the right which was tedded vs a mow co row on the left left.
Photo 3 shows the difference between rows if tines are not set to ted out when rowing. My father ran over these rows initially with tines incorrectly set so I decided to re-do. Row on the right has been re-done. Row on the left also shows what can happen if not driving correctly on the row and one rotor is catching more grass than the other.

The tractor we use is MF 35x and tractor and haybob together worth aprox €3k?. Probably uses €2 - €3 diesel per hour, so less than €1 per acre to ted, saving possibly €24 per acre, so well worth doing.

Naw 35 wont move bales. Lift em ok, but front wheels off the ground. Two tractors, 390T with single handler, MF 4255 with front loader and rear handler. Sometimes borrow double handler off a friend.

We stack in 3 locations, main yard, at end of road down thru land and at outlying shed so no long draws. Bales down end of road need to come in over the winter tho but doesn't seem much of a job moving a couple every day over a few weeks.

Generally cut in batches of 80 - 100 , so 6 or 7 busy days over 4 - 6 weeks. A comfortable seat helps. After that turn up the radio and relax. No point getting excited.

Going forward... wrote: »

Baling after a haybob is a sure way of going gray while at the same time making poorly shaped bales.

I'm not bothered if contractor goes grey or not. I'm just interested in improving quality of the feed and reducing the amount paid to contractor. Contractor we use is happy to bale away after the hay bob with Fusion 2 baler. If he's not interested there's plenty more around. Bales come out solid & in good shape once you make decent rows as outlined above.

jimmy G M wrote: »

We'd make 500 -700 bales pa. Used to do pit however base need to be resurfaced and we got scalded a few years with contractor coming in wet weather ploughing up fields etc.

We always ted the grass and I agree with relig - you will get at least 2 bales less per acre.

Usually contractor cuts with his 10ft mow co. If he is mad busy we can cut ourselves with 8ft std disk mower. Contractor charges €1.50 per bale for cutting so @ circa €15/acre hardly worth mowing ourselves.

We ted / row with a pz haybob driven by MF 35x with some simple modifications;

Firstly I drilled a few extra holes along the gates so I can vary the width of the rows. This allows me spread the row from the mow co out over 7 - 8 ft if I want, and re- row back to the same width as the mow co did originally. (A normal haybob row is narrower)

Second I always ted and row the grass with the tines set to ted. When tines are set to row, the hay bob tends to leave the grass piled high in the middle of the row and leads to bales with poor shoulders. When set to ted the grass is scattered evenly over the width of the row.

Thirdly how you drive is critical - no need to over rev as leads to lumping. Always drive to ensure that each rotor is catching the same amount of grass. If one rotor is catching more grass than the other it throws the grass back heavier on one side or the row than the other leading to uneven rows and slopey bales. I always try to ensure that the 1 mow co row is tedded out and goes back into the same row thus ensuring even rows as much as possible.

Have to agree with your 3 points above as I do the same myself.