Posted by redforlife on May 24, 2023 at 23:02:05 from (174.213.210.50):
In Reply to: Amount of alfalfa posted by flying belgian on May 24, 2023 at 18:26:11:
Bottom line, if your after quality, you'll clip it off more often. I personally think you'll end up with less hay if you do, but the quality will be better.
That said, if your waiting to long to cut it off (full bloom or past), you'll start losing tonnage also. It'll start losing leaves while still standing, and that in turn would have to render tonnage loss. Would be double loss actually, by the time you figure in the start over delayment.
What your feeding it to makes a difference also. Your dairy guys are after (and in need of) top quality. You watch those guys, and you'll see alfalfa clipped off barely in bloom. Maybe just before it starts to bloom. Your beef guys seem to be more lenient and not as strict about top quality. Perhaps even going for quantity rather than quality. You watch those guys, and they are more apt to clip it off at 15 to 20 percent in bloom or after. But you got to realize that they are just in need of good hay, and don't really need that top quality dairy hay.
A guy might be smarter if he looks at some other factors, rather than putting all of his eggs in one basket with plant maturity. Weather, weavels, grasshoppers, and such all playing a part in factors as well. It wouldn't make any sense at all to cut alfalfa down just before a forecasted week long rainy spell. All because your plant maturity scale says to wack it off today. And it also wouldn't make much sense to 'NOT' mow it off early when it's getting riddled by grasshoppers and hasn't yet met your maturity liking.
You can RUIN a WHOLE cutting of alfalfa by mowing it off at the wrong time. And that can happen at any maturity level. If your following a strict clip off schedule, you are making yourself more prone to running into a catastrophe with weather or whatever else that might not be cooperating.
I feed 95 percent of my hay. And I feed it to beef cattle. I need all of it to be feedable hay once its in the bale. I do care about quality. But it's definately not my only concern. I would definately settle for fare to good on all of it, rather than supreme on most of it and ruining a whole cutting here and there. A guy might have a different opinion if he was selling all of it and going after the prime dollars.
Truly a subject that can be deciphered from different angles. What one does, might not pencil for somebody else.
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