explain this to me.....

Now in Texas it is unusual to grow alfalfa.. but there's a few field by me that are alfalfa.. usually they come in cut it, rake and round bale it.... but today they came in and cut it, raked it then had some kind of krone baler that baled it and wrapped it.. all in the same day.... now isn't green hay combustible? wouldn't it get all moldy? sorry i just have never seen this in Texas.. would someone please explain this process to me.
 
That's a fairly new machine from Krone. It's combining two machines into one- one to make the bale and another to wrap it, all in one operation.
 
Well I hate to tell you guys across the pond but
we beat you all to it! Round bale silage was invented
by a Brit in the 1980s. The method of conserving
silage in round bales in silage was pioneered in
the 1980"s by a British farmer called Lloyd
Forster. The original method was to put them into
big plastic bags sealed with cable ties which was
a very slow and tedious job and the results were
"mixed" to say the least. Then whilst travelling
through Australia Mr. Forster was approached by a
firm that was making a machine to wrap bales in
plastic. However,the first successful machine for stretch wrapping
silage bales was built by Kverneland in
association with Mr. Forster and a British animal feed company
called Volac. We bought one almost as soon as they
appeared on the market because we were sick of
making poor quality hay due to a run of very wet
summers we were having at the time. If made
correctly, round bale silage is wonderful stuff.
Lloyd Forster
Edit. While I was researching this, I found that sadly Mr. Forster died last April.
 
And a firm called McHale here in Ireland developed the baler -
wrapper all in one combination. As Roy said we depend on it.....no
matter how wet the grass is it still makes good silage...last
'summer' we even had to bale in the rain!. Maybe you missed my
post last week where I showed pics of wrapping small square bales
of hay to make haylage for horses?
Sam
a120633.jpg
 
Roy,

Almost all the good new farm techniques originate in the UK or Europe. I'm proud to say that what happened 15 or 20 years ago, is now adopted in the USA.

I am grateful for the farm innovation. I always look to the east for the next big thing. I'm glad that someone gets a new idea every generation. Look at the FWD tractor market. before the push pull plow in the early 80's, a FWD tractor was rare in the states. I'm glad to see that even though we don't do the up and over ploughing, we still have adopted the FWD tractor.


I hope that you know that I am on top of the trends that originated out your way. I just hope that the newest trends will make my life a lot easier.


Thanks for being on top of the newest trends.

John
 
Nothing new about wraping wet bales here in Canada either. Dairy faarmers have been wraping big round bales since tne early 1980's. Tha wraper in the picture is an older modle I have that I belive came out of Finland. The wife and I have wraped over 350 bales in the last week of June.Bales can be wraped as I do induvidually, or in a tube,or continueous line wraped in a long row. Bruce
a120634.jpg
 
I was in England once (Chipperfield) in the early 80's. I wondered what all those huge plastic bags were for in the fields - a taxi driver actually explained to me that it was a new expiremental process for round bales.

... I remember thinking you guys were crazy!
 
Almost...
Another unsung hero that has saved farmers thousands
of man hours throughout the world was indeed an
American. John Appleby, The man who pioneered the
Twine Knotter.
John Appleby.
 
Like sileage in a silo or pit, if you cut the air off to cellulose materials, and the process works right, spoilage bacteria will start to work and burn up the oxygen in the material. Then, an amazing thing starts to happen. Another bacteria, also present, starts to multiply and causes the material to start to break down and release sugars in the material and ferment. The spoilage bacteria dies in the newer acid envirionment without oxygen, and the fermentation process preserves the material in a new form as it literally cooks itself slowly at somewhere around 150 degrees or so. It seems that the cows like it, and will eat it like candy. Plus, it's high tonnage and quick to put up. Mine goes into a big bunk silo, and while I might lose a bit on the top where the air can still get to it, the little bit that does spoil gets mixed with the rest of it and the cows eat all of it. McHale just started doing it to hay in bags, which is rather labor intensive, but it sure saves a lot of hay which otherwise would have been tossed out into a fencerow or woods.
 
The Krone and Mchale combo balers Wrappers are selling well all over the NW U.S. The silage coming out of the bales at feeding time will have the best appeal to both beef and dairy cows beyond dry hay. Many of the custom operators have gone to the combo because it allows to bale at 60 percent moisture and keeps perfectly. If the hay does get too dry you can just bale it without wrapping. Many of the balers have a knife cutting system to cut the hay into small pieces so the cows don,t drag long stems out of the feeder plus the cut hay is more palatable for the cows stomach. Migraine
 
I don't know about your Mrs. but I remember watching that bale whizzing around on the turntable, especially on a sunny day with the sun glinting on the plastic, doesn't half make you feel dizzy!
 
If it originated in the 80s in England, it didn't take long to make a big swim, because I was born in 81 and it seems that a couple neighbors had always wrapped bales.
 
They like it alright... when I was a kid, we lived close enough to Montreal to get bran from the Seagram's distillery, and the paste from the Moslon and LaBatt breweries.... trucking was almost free back then, sometimes the mash was free... and 110% was licked off the floor, stantions, each other, everywhere their cute little tongues could reach... not to mention any names, but if you sucked up the juice with an eyedropper and strained it thru cheesecloth...
Anyway, yeah, just the thing for hay that can never dry, and even the extra cost of the plastic and machinery, watching every blade of grass get fought over rather than pushed around by a fussy nose,,, that makes it all worth the effort don't it?
 
Hi John, The "Up and over" plow or reversible as we
call it has virtually replaced the conventional plow
here. At the risk of sounding like a broken record
we started using drum and disc type mowers here in
the late 1960's.(After having toyed with Howard
rotovators second most disastrous machine, the
Haytimer flail mower) Quite honestly I can't
remember the last time I saw someone mowing a field
here with a tractor drawn sickle mower.
 

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