anyone feeding silage?

[1shotwade]

I remember silage as being corn and cane that was put in the silo. I was wondering about other plants that could be used as silage.Since I have a chipper I thought it would be good to use sweetcorn folage after the crop was in but don't want to overlook anything else that would be good.(of course I'm talking small scale here)
Also,what animals would consume it?Are there certain animals that this would harm?I have about 40 each 55 gal metal barrels I could store it in but just don't want to make a dumb mistake. Thanks!

[jwal10]

I have used a lot of things to make silage, corn, sudan, alfalfa, lotus, red clover, pasture grass, leavings from sweetcorn picked for the canneries using a flail chopper, bean and corn waste from the canneries, brewers grains, high moisture corn. The idea is to have enough moisture to get it to ferment and then packed in tight enough to seal off the air from getting in. You can make it in garbage bags but it needs to be packed in tight. Sealed barrels would work, stomp it in good and seal. It is best to have a drain in it IF it is really wet material. Chopped in 1/2 to 3/4 " pieces. Bean vines and pods, corn stalks, husks and ears. Don't know about cole crops. I have even made and fed peppermint straw silage. Dryer material can be made into haylege too, a lot of forage is bagged or rolled when the weather won't cooperate to get dry enough for hay....James

[1shotwade]

James,thanks for the reply. I've never done this,only helped in the field.Sounds like I have a feasible idea.I guess even grass clippings or even just weeds I usually bushhog and let lay might work also.I do have about 12 acres of warm season grasses that isn't being used that might work also.
Are you aware of any animals this would be harmful to feed? I'm wanting to expand from just chickens to just a couple each of goats,sheep,hogs rabbits and other foul. I would suppose they should all use it as food but don't know.
I was looking into producing pellets for my own use and it seems way to costly to justify and thought this would be a possible option.Any other things I need to watch out for that I haven't thought of yet?

Thanks,Wade

[rambler]

Cementing silage uses the sugar or starch in the crop to cure into a pickle juice sort of.

You need to be rid of oxygen - that is why it needs to be packed tight, no air gaps not even the tiny ones.

You want the moisture to be around 60%. Depending on the crop. Too wet and it becomes soup, too dry and the fermenting process doesn't happen right.

Metal barrels and that juice might not hold up real well, I don't know. Plastic would have been better.

Critters with the multiple stomachs use silage much better than others. Chickens and hogs would get very little from it, it is mostly a fiber as cattle use.



Paul

[joebill]

Used to be a farm where we hunted that spread black plastic into erosion cuts that were in the hillsides and packed silage into them, then tightly wrapped the plastic. They were known for buying fields of corn and such that were too wet and mud covered to harvest, then going in and harvesting by hand and converting to silage and making money when nobody else could in wet years, but that was before tractors and other harvesters floated like boats on those giant tires.....Joe

[hippygirl]

So, basically, silage is "fermented compost" (as you can tell, I know nothing about silage!)?

[o&itw]

Silage is "anaerobically" fermented. Compost is aerobically rotted. They are almost opposites of each other. If one ferments cabbage under water to keep the air out one has sauerkraut. If one lets cabbage sit wet, with the air getting to it, they have a rotten mess. The anaerobic bacteria such as botulism cannot reproduce in an acid or alcoholic environment that is produced by the yeasts that cause fermentation.

[sammyd]

Your biggest problem would be feeding.
The stuff starts to go bad once you open your container whether it's a 5 gallon bucket or a multi ton pile.
Back when I was on a farm that used a silo we had to feed at least 3-4 inches of silage out of a silo to keep the stuff from going bad, it wasn't so bad when it was cold but when it was warm it was pretty critical. Even with 40 dairy cows it was a challenge to get them to eat enough from a 20 foot Diam silo to keep the top from getting a gray tinge sometimes...

We have made garbage bag silage from field corn and grass clippings.
The grass clippings we just raked off the yard and bagged but the corn was a large project and we used a regular forage chopper since the small chipper we had was a pain when doing things in large quantities, for small batches it worked OK.
We put the corn in old feed sacks and packed them really tight, stomping and banging on them till they wouldn't settle anymore, then we put those in heavy garbage bags and used an old vacuum to suck out any air. They actually got about half again as small. Then twisted the bag and taped it shut. It was a nice size to throw at the goats or use a couple for the cows.
We didn't use barrels because I didn't think I could get them packed well without a good mechanical stomper and was worried that the moist silage would freeze into the barrel and I wouldn't get the stuff out in the winter.

[geo in mi]

Originally Posted by jwal10

I have used a lot of things to make silage, corn, sudan, alfalfa, lotus, red clover, pasture grass, leavings from sweetcorn picked for the canneries using a flail chopper, bean and corn waste from the canneries, brewers grains, high moisture corn. The idea is to have enough moisture to get it to ferment and then packed in tight enough to seal off the air from getting in. You can make it in garbage bags but it needs to be packed in tight. Sealed barrels would work, stomp it in good and seal. It is best to have a drain in it IF it is really wet material. Chopped in 1/2 to 3/4 " pieces. Bean vines and pods, corn stalks, husks and ears. Don't know about cole crops. I have even made and fed peppermint straw silage. Dryer material can be made into haylege too, a lot of forage is bagged or rolled when the weather won't cooperate to get dry enough for hay....James

Could I ask you what is lotus?

geo

[jwal10]

Lotus or birdsfoot trefoil is a plant not unlike alfalfa. It grows on wetter ground than alfalfa and is finer stemmed. We grew it for seed but cut the first cutting for hay and also baled the straw after the combine for roughage. It pastured well and could be irrigated for a heavier crop. It was great feed for flushing the ewes before breeding. It does not cause bloat in cattle when pastured....James

http://plants.usda.gov/factsheet/pdf/fs_loco6.pdf