BALZAC, Alta. – Before 2002, Allen Jones used straw swaths as part of the winter feeding program for his cows. But with extremely dry conditions that year, he was concerned how reliable this would be.
“The straw was a little thinner and everyone was short of feed, so it was real expensive. I could see the cows rooting through it and if we got a little bit of snow, it would be done,” said Jones, who crops about 3,800 acres and runs 220 cows on his farm near Balzac, Alta.
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Discussions with an 87-year-old uncle, Jim Hole, suggested another option to collect this cheap feed source.
“Years ago, he’d used something a lot like the design we’ve got today. But his was on a wagon and made for smaller combines. It was like a box, with a hydraulic unload on it. The straw and chaff was blown into a wagon at the same time, then you’d hit a trip and it would unload.”
Jones had seen other straw-chaff piles made with wagons, that were 1.5 metres deep, four metres long and a nightmare to clean up in the spring. He didn’t want that, but he felt a smaller version might work.
“We started from scratch. We wanted something that would be automatic, so we ended up going with a counterweight for the automatic dump. We used some steel off an old dump rake. That’s what I built the first parts out of.”
Jones attached mild steel from the rake to the rear axle of the combine where it was easiest to fit on the tie rods.
“From those brackets is your buncher and your pivot points. (The combine) drops the straw and chaff out onto the buncher, and you adjust your weights up front if you want a bigger or smaller pile.”
As the combine moves down the field, straw and chaff come out the rear of the combine and fall on the buncher. When it gets to its set weight, the buncher automatically tips down where the tines are, stubble slides through the tines and wipes the bunch off. Then it tilts back up and resets.
It leaves two-by-two metre bunches, about a quarter of a metre deep, throughout the field.
Each bunch is about 15 kilo-grams of straw and chaff.
Farmers with the buncher unit on their combines have a range of options for feeding the piles. Jones uses his as a maintenance ration for pregnant cows.
“Say we wean the cows in September or October, then we kick those cows out on the bunches. We let them clean the field up before we move them. A field might last two weeks or it might last a month and a half,” Jones said.
“We have some 70 or 80 acre fields, we have some quarter sections and some half sections. We also have one field that’s a section that we rent and we put up electric wires around it.”
Hauling water adds hassle and expense, so Jones makes sure he has access to water on the fields where he uses the buncher.
“If we get snow, we won’t worry as much about the water. If that shrinks off, we’d make sure the fields had water, either dugout or wells, and use a solar pump. A lot of times, when we run these cows on bunches, the first 90 days all we’ll give them is mineral.
“They’ll go eat at a bunch. If another cow comes up beside, they’ll still sit there eating. But if a third one comes in, the bunches are small enough, it makes them uncomfortable for three cows to eat, so one will take off and go to the next bunch.
“It’s the happiest I’ve seen our cows. They can sprawl out and graze and there isn’t much that bothers them. As far as pecking orders go, they’ve all got their own space. Last year, the bunches lasted us well into March.”
Jones said consumption depends on grazing intensity and weather conditions.
“We’ve seen it where the cows have grazed it down so there’s nothing left to heavy harrow. You could go straight in and seed. We’ve also seen it where the snow was 60 centimetres deep and there was more residue left in the field. But in our area, we normally heavy harrow anyhow. So we heavy harrow it to move that residue.”
Jones has used the buncher with spring wheat, barley and canola. While he doesn’t have any pulse crops in his rotation, he feels it would work well with lentils and peas, too.
“I think they prefer barley the best. Hard red spring wheat is not as palatable, but it’s still workable. I think canola is in between. But with canola, there is a little bit more of a residue issue to clean up. The straw’s fairly long and you can get a bit of a mat in the spring. You’d have to heavy harrow it.”
Jones said last winter ranchers were advertising to custom graze cows for $1.70 a head per day.
“That seemed to be a heck of a pile of money to me to custom winter these cows. Whether you use $1.70, $1.50 or even $1 a head a day, there’s a real cost,” he said.
“If you put the cows on bunches, they’re using a product that’s already been paid for because we’ve had our cash crop off it. They’re going to get the balance of that, and we’re going to give those cows some mineral and supplement them as required. If it goes to minus 40, maybe we give them five pounds of barley each per day, or every other day. I think we can run these cows for 20 cents a head per day, or less.”
Jones can’t imagine being without bunches in his operation. He said what he saves in winter feeding costs with the buncher makes the payment on the combine each year.
“Years ago, we used to use greenfeed swaths, and we always thought we were saving money because we didn’t have to bale the feed or haul the manure. But now, if we grow a barley crop and it runs a couple hundred dollars an acre, you pull your money out of that acre first, then the cows go in and eat it after.
“The other way, if you put greenfeed in and you want those cows to go eat those greenfeed swaths, you’re trying to force $200 an acre into that cow’s mouth and get it back out of her. So opportunity cost is huge. If you can save $1 a day per cow on feeding costs on a couple of hundred cows, that’s $200 a day. That really adds up.”
Jones also feels he’s improving the soil by using the buncher. He thinks the best crops are where the bunches have been the year before. His CPS wheat went six bushels an acre more on land where the cows had been bunch fed.
“Part of it is, there’s more tilth in the soil. I think the cows are increasing the rate in which the organic matter breaks down and I think those bunches hold snow. When you put the cows in, they pack that snow down onto the ground. But the No. 1 reason you’d do it is because of the cost of running the cow.”
Jones said the bunchers sell for $3,500, with the mounting brackets extra, because they’re different for every combine.
For more information, contact Allen Jones, Balzac, Alta., 403-226-0767 or AJ Manufacturing, 403-938-3024.
