Pit v bales

countygorey

at 100 euro an acre what price would bales be worth considering on a first cut of normal irish crops plese stick to question thanks

BalingMad

well, I moved from pit to bales a number of years ago for the reasons that, it was meant to be better feeding.., the option of selling bales, and that i could do a lot of the work myself as in mowing, tedding, drawing & stacking etc, but i'm in a predicument now on whether to change back. it is very hard to make a good bale with no spoilage. And the expense of each bale including very expencive plastic wrap!
Bales are better feeding if you can make a good bale, which is very hard, and trust me i'm trying as I've invested in a lot of equipment and applied good silage baling practice to ensure good quality, but it isn't paying off as good as i had hoped. And in terms of selling the bales, the country is flooded with them!
Silage into a pit for 100 an acre is v good and stress free for the farmer. Compare that with a bale of silage costing around 14 a bale for everything including fertilizer etc over the course of the year. Stick to pit if your set up for it in my opinion.

6480

countygorey wrote: »

at 100 euro an acre what price would bales be worth considering on a first cut of normal irish crops plese stick to question thanks

pit much cheaper than bales

GERMAN ROCKS

defo stick with the pit. bales are very expensive in comparison. if you have a heavy cut especially. bales should only be made imo when a paddock goes too strong and anything stopped specially for silage should be going to a pit. also in winter bales are a lot more work. in and out the loader the whole time in the cold and wet. then coming back into loader with dirty hands destroying everything. theres a lot to be siad to just go into the pit take a grab of silage and place it infront of the cows. i have very little waste with the pit. i put on three layers of plastic only buying one new layer each year and then reusing last years other two layers. the only inconvience i have with the pit is rolling back the plastic and covering the pit. once the pit is covered properly, there should be very little waste.

buffalobilly

stick with the pit stuff bales are far 2 expensive
and all that bloody plastic and net to deal with
as well
bad old smell with the bales 2:(

tismesoitis

pit all the way with a good sheer grab!! i think pit silage would need to be close to double the price it is at the moment before bales start to be an economic option

raher1

Double chop in bales if for she'd use

Muckit

Sonye wrote: »

Double chop in bales if for she'd use

Youa notta speaka english?

blue5000

Not sure what prices will be this year with feckin dsl going up every week, but last yr if there was more than 7 bales/acre pit silage was working out cheaper.

countygorey

blue5000 wrote: »

Not sure what prices will be this year with feckin dsl going up every week, but last yr if there was more than 7 bales/acre pit silage was working out cheaper.

thanks

rs8

talking to a contractor yesterday, €9.50 per bale and you supply the wrap Vs €85 wagon silage............

Enderol

Pit is always good but a few bales at the start if your feeding a few animals early.

GERMAN ROCKS wrote: »

... i put on three layers of plastic only buying one new layer each year and then reusing last years other two layers. the only inconvience i have with the pit is rolling back the plastic and covering the pit. once the pit is covered properly, there should be very little waste.

Do you find three layers preserves the silage better? We've always used two.

GERMAN ROCKS

Enderol wrote: »

Pit is always good but a few bales at the start if your feeding a few animals early.



Do you find three layers preserves the silage better? We've always used two.

well its hard to know but i think so. anyway i would always buy a new layer every year so might aswell use two old layers instead of one. its very easy to through on the third layer, its putting on the tyres are a curse but the smae amount of them have to be put on if its either two or three layers. no i wouldnt have a whole pile of waste afterwards compare dto some farmers i see but they could be just careless

jeff greene

Make our own bales but considering pit for first cut this year as its new land further away, also with diesel, plastic etc, a lot to be said for pit plus less wear and tear on the feeder in the winter.

Conflats

There is def a place for bales still, a lot of lads dont have the big acreage for pit all in the 1 cut, lad can be fragmented with many miles apart so draw would be awkward, bales while dearer do offer good quality silage imo we switched to bales only about 10 years ago (due to no tank and other reasons mentioned above) we never have had to throw a bale out for poor quality and very rare we get bad spoliage, i personnally put it down to they are handled once, use green or white plastic only NO black! and they are checked for damage at least once a week as for price, contractor charges €7.50/bale stacked in the yard (we draw in) plastic worked out at €3/bale and fert was for us around €3-4

gordon_gekko

BalingMad wrote: »

well, I moved from pit to bales a number of years ago for the reasons that, it was meant to be better feeding.., the option of selling bales, and that i could do a lot of the work myself as in mowing, tedding, drawing & stacking etc, but i'm in a predicument now on whether to change back. it is very hard to make a good bale with no spoilage. And the expense of each bale including very expencive plastic wrap!
Bales are better feeding if you can make a good bale, which is very hard, and trust me i'm trying as I've invested in a lot of equipment and applied good silage baling practice to ensure good quality, but it isn't paying off as good as i had hoped. And in terms of selling the bales, the country is flooded with them!
Silage into a pit for 100 an acre is v good and stress free for the farmer. Compare that with a bale of silage costing around 14 a bale for everything including fertilizer etc over the course of the year. Stick to pit if your set up for it in my opinion.

most people find they have a lot more waste in a pit in comparison to bales , on paper thier is no doubt that pit is cheaper to make but thier is nothing more expensive than bad silage , IMO , you need to wilt silage for bailing , apart from the fact that you get more DM in the bale , they are easier to handle when dry and less prone to sagging and ripping , wilted silaged when baled is not that expensive and is great stuff

Juniorhurler

The key to pit silage is roll, roll and then roll some more when putting it in the pit. We would find that there would be very little waste on the pit. I don't buy the whole quality argument, either baled or pit if it is made right it will be good feeding, if its not made right it won't be good feeding. Simples.