(quoted from post at 17:05:39 07/11/12) I'm so glad I'm not in alaska! Do you have bad rain at peak of hay season? Some years we get rain everyday through the whole month of May, and couple weeks in june. Some years, we get rain every other day.
When I say "turned silage," I mean that it gets put up with a chopper and stored in the silo. Horses will founder on hay silage if you over feed, but they love it.
As far as salting the hay stack goes, Salt actually does help, not just make it taste better. Unless you have found really recent science that says I'm wrong, it's been common farm practice for as long as I know. I don't know if the haymaker's handbook has anything to say on it, I'll check. I'm pretty sure a quick online search will find info that supports me. Or, maybe you found others who disagree... Regardless, proprionic is better, but I assume Dave doesn't have an applicator set-up.
One of the biggest mistakes that people make with hay is to cut it at the wrong time of the day, or the just the wrong time. If hay gets cut while the dew is still on, it takes too long to dry out. If hay gets cut the day after a rain storm, the ground under the hay is too damp, and the hay will pick up the moisture and trap it as soon as you lay it down.
So, mid-afternoon to early evening on ground that was rained on... and, anytime after all the dew has completely burned off. I just watch the color of my front tractor tires. I can tell exactly what the moisture is like just by watching my tires. If they shine, it's way way too wet. if they are a dark clean black, it's still too wet. If they turn a bit to teh gray side of black, it is just right. If they get covered in dust, I think you better pray for it to rain! LOL
I was mowing hay this year at a certain point right before I cut myself off where the dust coming out of the haybine made it hard to see. The hay wasn't burned up, but the ground was just that dry. I was sitting at 20% moisture after 14 hours of dry time. That is way way too dry for my liking.
You can disagree with me anytime. I don't pretend to know everything, but I do it professionally.
I will say this, though...
I have heard so many myths and things that vets and horse trainers have said, where I can jump on g-oogle and disprove them in less than 15 seconds. Then, I get the crazy horse ladies who will open a bale up adn toss it in the air to see if dust comes out of it, telling me that all dust is mold spores. Truthfully, I don't think I have ever seen hay that doesn't get dusty after setting in the barn for a few months. I tell them to come back with a mold test kit, and then, I never see them again.
We usually don`t get that bad of rain, Fairbanks only averages 10" per year, but it usually comes in just small enough quantities to keep hay farming interesting. It usually seems to be dry through June, with about 8-10 good days in July, and then we usually get a real nice stretch early in september, but then the dew comes off so late, and on so early, that dry-down is slow. Then some years are totally out of character, and Alaska is so big that what works in Fairbanks might not in Delta, or much less on the coast at Palmer. Then again, I`m selling timothy/brome squares for $12 a bale, and I`m on the cheap side.
I gotcha on the silage comment, I misunderstood. I`m not set up with a chopper yet, but I`m looking at getting one and some cows to diversify a bit, and put any wasted hay to use.
As for salting the stack, I`ve done it, learned the trick from my dad, and I think it has its place, but I honestly don`t think it will save hay that is too damp to keep. Where I have seen the best results is when I get clumps of vetch in the bales, they dry down muchslower, and can spoil a good portion of the bale. My reason for not think salt helps much is merely because of the weight of water in a damp bale (very noticeable) VS. the amount of salt usually applied and the amount of weight that the bales lose (not much). I guess pickiling the hay will keep it from spoiling, though.
As for cutting at the wrong time of day, I mostly agree with you. I wait for the dew to come off, other than that I try to mow as early as I can. When we are trying to get hay dry as fast as possible, often we have to cut when our tires are a bit damp rolling on the ground, but we leave it in a windrow, let the sun and wind dry the ground, and then ted it out, our ground is almost always moist so it works better than nothing. As for cutting too dry, never seen that, doubt I will!
We have our share of crazies up here, they don`t know a thing about hay or making it, but they certainly are willing to share the wives tales. I had quite a few leave before I started fibbing about what my fields are. Several of my fields are meadow foxtail, a good cool-season grass very similar to timothy in appearance, with no relation to barley foxtail, that everybody knows and hates. Nobody would buy my hay, until I told them all it was timothy, and not a one has known better yet.
