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When I talk to someone who has made fantastic silage on their farm, I am more likely to roll my eyes and inwardly groan in weary resignation than feel any sort of envy or inspiration.
I attempt every year to make plenty of good-quality fodder for my livestock, sometimes with varying results. But this year, I have broken previous farm records.
Unfortunately, not for the right reasons, and some of my grass is officially (according to the analysis) the poorest-quality silage in the last 10 years.
I did anticipate a wide variation in my fodder analysis and, writing in the Irish Farmers Journal back in July, I said that quality would be “highly variable”, and also that I was expecting “a lower feed value than in recent years”.
However, my individual field predictions weren’t even close to being correct.
Firstly, there was one pleasant surprise, and this involved a 12ac field that forms the mainstay of conserved grass on the home farm. It was mown in fine condition (on 3 June), only to have two days of rain transform it into a sorry mess of saturated swards.
Broken weather in June meant that all silage operations came to a halt, and it wasn’t until the fourth week of that month that we chanced cutting grass at the rented farm
Eventually, it was tedded out, rowed up, and was baled on day four in reasonable condition. However, the bales stacked badly, and the combination of delayed baling and misshapen bales were a cause for concern all summer.
Amazingly, both cattle and sheep think it’s tasty stuff, and the analysis shows an ME of 11.1, D-value of 70, protein of 16.2%, and dry matter of 22.9%. Overall, a huge relief.
Best silage
The other field at home is (theoretically) the best silage I have: six acres was mown on 22 May and was baled in decent order after wilting for a day and a half. It has analysed as ME 11.2, D-value 70, protein 14.9%, and dry matter 27.5%. Again, it seems to be readily scoffed by any class of livestock. That’s the end of the good news – now for the rest.
Broken weather in June meant that all silage operations came to a halt, and it wasn’t until the fourth week of that month that we chanced cutting grass at the rented farm.
This delay proved fatal, and one field in particular has analysed very poorly. Luckily, it was only three acres, because an ME of 9.4, D-value 59, protein 10.4%, and dry matter 36.6% isn’t something to be proud of.
I really am disappointed, because the sun shone for two days after mowing, and I ran it through the wuffler several times. By the time it was baled, it almost smelt of hay, and after opening several bales, I honestly thought it might be perfect stuff for feeding pregnant ewes.
There’s no doubt that the rumen stability figure is extremely high, but it would need to be to offset the effects of the enormous meal levels necessary to sustain pregnant sheep.
Similar fate
The fourth field suffered a similar fate and analysed marginally better. ME 9.7, D-value 60, protein 10.3%, and dry matter 34.9% tells me that it is more of the same.
About the only positive I can think of would be the ease of handling and transporting this type of material, and compared with the damper silage at home, this stuff is a pleasure to handle.
Sheep comparison
Of considerable interest will be the comparison between different batches of ewes.
They are divided into Mules, and Texel x Mules, and a four-way split will make for a decent on-farm trial to see who loses body condition and who stays fat.
I should expect both lots at home to maintain condition until the introduction of meal in January, while those poor animals being offered the low-quality fodder should be dropping slightly on a weekly basis.
I’ll be handling them regularly over the coming weeks, although my own notion would be that the difference between flocks will not be as great as the analysis would suggest. I will let you know.
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