Making oat hay

Joe Pro

Member
Hello guys, I have about 3 acres of Oats ( The oats were planted as a cover crop for a hay seeding ).
It won't be practical to have someone come and combine this 3 acre field of oats, and other then maybe selling the oats standing in the field to the Amish a few people mentioned making the oats for hay.

Can you dry ( small square bale ) oats for hay.
I could mow them with my hay-bine and small square bale if this can be done.

When do you mow it? I cant recall exactly- but someone mentioned if its done incorrectly a chemical can be harmful to the cattle its fed to.
 
Make sure you have a lot of good drying days for it to lay. The seed will be wet and will take a long time to dry down.
 
Neighbor always had his horse pastured outside the oat field. Said when the horse went into the oats it was time to cut. Always cut when in the dough stage.
 
Ditto on the mice, they will tunnel through the oat hay bales like crazy. If you use sisal twine they will eat the strings off the bales too (for desert?). Feeding the bales reminded me of shelling a crib of old corn, a mouse or two seemed to drop out of every bale. We only made oat hay once. My uncle chopped oats for silage for feeder cattle, but only put it in the upright silo, never in the pit silo.

If I remember right our cattle liked oat hay a lot too. I don't know the nutritional value, but I suspect it was very high. If oat hay is dry it stores as well as other hay, but field mice are drawn to it and will ruin it. Try to feed all your oat hay early or sell it out of the field if you cannot feed it within six months. Any horse people in your area?
 
I've made lots of good oat hay. Cut it at early dough stage. If you have a conditioner on your haybine, set there rollers as far apart as you can so it's less likely to damage the seeds. Don't give oats a lot of nitrogen because they can be too high in nitrates that way. Most of the nitrates are in the lower part of the stem so you can cut the stubble a little higher than normal to reduce nitrates.
 
Makes wonderful silage if there's a chance you can't get enough drying - cut at milky stage, baled and wrapped! Cows love it! I made it as my main winter feed for cattle for many years.
 
I try to mow oats for hay just after the head comes out of the boot. If it gets more mature our goats don't seem to like it as much. Also, as others have stated, if there is any grain in the hay mice can become a serious problem. I made that mistake once and never again.
 
yep cows love it especially if it has some young alalafa mixed in. Do as these guys are saying. I always rolled it up in small round bales and did not have to worry about mice problems.
 

For best oat hay cut it as soon as it's 75-90% headed when seed heads contain water to milk stage depending on weather. IMHO soft dough is too late to cut as seed heads will harden drawing rodents.[/url]
 
Milk stage and dough stage refers to the oat kernels. Milk is when the contents of the seed kernel is still liquid (looks like milk). Dough is when it has started to firm up, but not hard yet (doughy). As stated, best to cut when head is just starting to emerge, so as not to be a mouse attractant. And if you really want a fiasco, store it on pallets. 4 inches of Mouse Hotel at the bottom, so they can range through the entire stack and completely destroy it.
 
Neighbor made oat silage cut Monday morning with a sickle mower raked that night in the pouring rain or kid did pop staid inside and dry then Tuesday small square baled it .Then hauled in to the chopper by the silo. I suspect it made good soup .
 
In my area all hay was oat hay. Cut in the milk stage. We used to cut it and let it lay in the swath for 5 days and rake it (cool coastal climate). Now days people are using swathers, so it is windrowed immediately. I started raking after one good sunny day. Then it needs to cure in the windrow for 10 days to 2 weeks before baling. Sometimes vetch is planted with the oats. Makes it a little more sustainable for mono cropping, vetch gives a nitrogen boost. Oat vetch hay is good for cows, some horse people are afraid of it.
 

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