RED DEER – Ensiling forage goes back 4,000 years, yet the quest for the perfect method continues to this day.
Silage involves cutting hay or green cereal, storing and packing it, to prompt aerobic activity, which allows fermentation to start.
Problems can occur at any phase in the process said Keith Bolsen, retired professor at Kansas State University now working out of Texas State. Sometimes the problems occur when the silage making crew has not been told what the owner wants, said Bolsen, who spoke at a feed and forage conference in Red Deer Dec. 2.
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He said dry matter is the most important quality. Crops should not go into the silo or pit too wet or too dry.
Vern Baron from Agriculture Canada at Lacombe, Alta., said there are no set rules to get perfect silage.
“There is no one thing in the decision-making factors, there are many,” he said.
Harvesting silage at the right stage is critical. Fibre levels can vary from year to year depending on location and weather. Varying levels of fibre could affect the rate of gain in livestock.
Baron said silage should be placed in the pit or silo at 30-40 percent dry matter. Dry matter ratios are a moving target and can change year to year because of weather, soil type or geographical location. In hot, dry weather, the cut can dry too quickly.
Bolsen said silage should be inoculated against spoilage, packed and sealed properly. Spoiled material should be thrown away. Unchecked silage can actually form a layer of slime that when blended into feed tastes bad and smells sour. Animals will back away from it. Surface spoilage can extend nearly a metre in the pack.
Packing is important because greater density decreases air movement and leads to a longer shelf life without spoilage.
“No one single factor will guarantee that we will reach our density target,” Bolsen said.
Quality needs to be assessed regularly and core samples should be taken to measure density as well as nutrient levels.
Most silage is fed, but as quality decreases animals eat less. There is less nutrient value and less fibre for better digestion.
The type of storage is not highly important but people often have the wrong size of storage bunker.
“For every trouble-shoot I have for a pit that is too small, I have 20 that are too big,” he said.
The best crop depends on geographical region, climate and crop variety.
“Know what will grow where you live and know what you want for your end product,” said Baron.
Studies at the western forage beef centre in Lacombe have determined semi-dwarf barley is superior in nutritive value. It is the cheapest of the high quality feedstuffs and will adapt well to irrigated and dryland.
Spring triticale gets mixed yields and provides acceptable nutrition.
“It has good potential when it is placed in a system properly,” said Baron.
Crop mixtures offer yield improvements, but it is important to consider the costs of seeding and managing a combination of herbicides and fertilizers.
Barley-pea mixtures are common. Some new pea varieties yield as well as barley, but as combinations they might be expensive to grow. However mixtures can improve cattle rate of gain. A grower might be better off with a high quality barley forage as opposed to a pea silage.
“The object of a mixture is that we want to improve something that we can’t get in one plant species,” Baron said.
Some corn is being grown for silage in Alberta. It can cost about $50 per acre more than barley to grow and may not do well without adequate heat.
When considering costs, finding the best crops for silage figure into the equation.
Trevor Yurchak, a beef and forage specialist with Alberta Agriculture, said silage is a valuable product because more feed can be put up on less land.
“We could look at growth of more than 35 percent more animals in this province if we switched everybody to silage,” he said.
Silage is economical compared to packaged hay.
“Dry feed is the highest cost feed,” he said.
Hay making equipment and delivering feed to animals can be more expensive than some other systems.
During the last two years when hay yield has been lower than average due to drought, a small shower can cause swaths to nearly disappear. A shower of five millimetres of rain could cause a loss of three to seven percent dry matter.
Yurchak recommends producers pick a feeding system and stick with it, rather than alternating. They also need to know what it costs to feed animals, and to process, store and deliver the feed.
“Know to the penny what it costs to put up your feed,” he said. “Those costs have to be recouped from those calves the momma cows are raising.”
He suggests sharing labour and equipment with neighbours or having work custom done because it could be cheaper in the longer term.
“If silage works for you, eliminate the dry equipment and focus on making silage systems efficient.”
