With any crop, the growing season is only half the battle, but this is especially true with silage. We recently caught up with Issac Mayer, North American sales manager for Ecosyl Products, Inc., to discuss best practices in dealing with and storing silage.

Controlling Moisture

“Harvesting the crops when they’re at the proper moisture is probably the most critical and important control factor that a farmer has control over,” says Mayer.

“The maturity or quality may not be exactly where we wanted, but achieving the proper moisture will allow the crop to ferment properly and more efficiently.”

Mayer recommends different moisture ranges for each storage methods, as follows:

Bunkers or drive over pile — 65 to 68 percent moisture
Bags — 63 to 68 percent
Upright silos — 63 to 66 percent
Oxygen-limiting silos — 55 to 66 percent
“Harvest is the most optimal time to apply a quality, research proven silage inoculant, such as Ecosyl inoculant with MTD/1 bacteria to help further enhance fermentation,” says Mayer.

Proper Packing

According to Mayer, bottlenecks can occur on bigger farms during harvest.

“As we move towards custom harvesting where we have a lot of very big forage harvesters out there, these machines can take in a lot of feed,” he says. “Some are able to chop eight, nine and even 10 tons a minute. That means chopped feed is being delivered to the bunker quickly.”

That’s why having enough packing equipment available is important, he explains.

“For packing silage, there are many different implements out there,” Mayer says. “It’s not necessarily important which pieces of equipment you’re using, but how you’re using that equipment, and if you have enough of that equipment.”

“Our goal is to get the feed packed in and get the oxygen driven out so we can create an anaerobic environment as quickly as possible,” he says.

Farmers should pack feed in six-inch layers. “If we start to get over eight-inch layers we’re just not able to pack it as well. Air is trapped inside, which allows undesirable fermentation processes to occur,” Mayer says.

Mayer likens the packing process—putting one six-inch layer on top of another—to putting in a fence post or corner post.

“We dig a hole and put in the post,” he says. “But we don’t then fill up the hole with dirt to the top and call it good. We put in a little dirt, tamp it repeatedly, put in more dirt, tamp it again and again, and so forth. This gives us a good, solid, sturdy post. It’s the same methodology here. We want a good, solid, sturdy pile.”

When packing silage, farmers should also look at the amount of weight per ton of feed being delivered.

“As a rule of thumb we look for 800 pounds per ton of silage coming in to the farm,” Mayer says. “For example, if we have eight loads of silage coming in and each load is 14 tons, our delivery rate is about 112 tons an hour. Then we multiply that by our 800 pounds per ton number. That means we need right around 90,000 pounds of tractor to put away that feed relatively well.”

When making calculations, farmers sometimes forget that the tractor is not always packing and not always on top of the silage.

“We know that upwards of 20 percent of the time, that tractor’s actually off that feed, grabbing the next bucket full of feed to push up there,” he explains. “So we probably want to put a fudge factor in there of 15 to 20 percent.”

In this hypothetical situation, says Mayer, we’re looking at about 110,000 pounds of total tractor weight. “Many times on the farm when we’re out there visiting with producers and talking through these calculations, it’s kind of an eye-opening moment, realizing they need to get another tractor up there.”

“If farmers don’t have the availability to have another tractor, they can add some weight to the tractors they do have,” he says.

“I’ve seen a lot of homemade weight brackets or cement blocks that farmers put on the three-point hitches,” says Mayer. “Anything we can do to get closer to that 800 number is just going to make a better quality feed, preserve that silage better and keep it fresh during feed out.”

Covering the Silage

Covering the packed feed as soon as possible is also critical.

“We want to get that feed covered up as quickly as we can with a good layer of plastic and then keep that plastic weighted down,” Mayer says.

“The purpose of the plastic is to not only keep off the rain and snow, but also to keep the oxygen away,” he says. “Oxygen is the number one problem with silage. When there’s oxygen available that means that the spoilage organisms like yeast and molds can grow.”

To further keep oxygen from getting under the plastic, Mayer recommends weighing down the plastic with tires or heavy gravel bags.

“There are even some enhanced oxygen barrier silage covers available that do a nice job and help control the spoilage on the top the pile a bit further,” Mayer says.

Feed Out Practices

“Taking feed out is an art form,” says Mayer. “There’s a right way and a wrong way.”

Farmers should remove feed from the pile or bag leaving a clean, straight edge with as little disturbance to the pile as possible.

“We always want to de-face that pile from the top down or from side to side, running perpendicular with the side of the bucket,” Mayer says.

Mayer advises farmers to avoid scooping up and inwards.

“That just allows cracks and fissures to form in the silage, which lets in air. Again, allowing oxygen into the pile means spoilage will occur,” Mayer says.

The rate at which feed is removed from the pile is also important. “We want to be move back on that face at a nice rate,” Mayer says. “We’d like to see a minimum of six inches during the cooler months and one foot during the warmer months. In summer, when we get a lot of heat and humidity, a couple of feet a day is recommended.”

“The more you feed, the fresher it’s going to stay for you,” says Mayer.

Mayer notes that using an inoculant that contains a research proven strain of an L. buchneri bacteria can help further enhance stability keeping feed fresher longer.

Protecting Your Investment

“When we look at the time and the expenses that farmers put into their silage, it’s an investment of hundreds of dollars an acre,” says Mayer.

Mayer urges farmers to follow best practices to protect their investment. Otherwise, farmers can lose up to 20 to 30 percent of their silage through shrinkage and spoilage.

“If we do a good job, we can keep those losses down with good protocol and good practices. We want to keep as much as we can, but ultimately we want to make sure the animals can get the most out of that feed, too, Mayer says.

Admittedly, harvest work frequently happens at a fast pace. It’s still important, Mayer stresses, to take the time to do things right and safe.

“Our goal is to provide quality feed for our cattle so they can provide us with a good quality of life,” Mayer says.