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Marshmallows (lots of pics)

G

gcreekrch

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 22, 2008
Messages
11,768
Location
west chilcotin bc
The end of the week was showery so we went into silage mode. For those who haven't seen a wrapper work, here is one.

Strung and ready
P8221144.jpg


Lined up
P8221145.jpg


From the cab.
P8221146.jpg


Loading
P8221147.jpg


3 wraps on and about to release wrap holder.
P8221148.jpg


Wrapped and dumping showing plastic in position to cut.
P8221150.jpg


Cut
P8221151.jpg


Dumped
P8221152.jpg


Ready for the next one.
P8221153.jpg


Bale handler
P8221154.jpg

P8221155.jpg


Marshmallows
P8221143.jpg


Stacked
P8221156.jpg
 
Ok i'm gonna ask. How do you make silage with the marshmallows?
I know how to do it with a silo and a pit, but not your way.
Educate me please. :D
 
What is the cost of the plastic and how hard is it to get off and dispose of? What moisture are you aiming for?
 
I Luv Herfrds said:
Ok i'm gonna ask. How do you make silage with the marshmallows?
I know how to do it with a silo and a pit, but not your way.
Educate me please. :D
Click to expand...

The plastic is pretty much like saran wrap and is stretched as it goes on to create an airtight cover on the bale. Within a very short time the oxygen inside disappears and the bale is protected from spoiling as long as no holes get poked in it. Basically what you put in is what you get out.
 
per said:
What is the cost of the plastic and how hard is it to get off and dispose of? What moisture are you aiming for?
Click to expand...

It costs about $5.50 a bale for the plastic. We would wrap every bale if we had the extra tractors and manpower at our disposal. If you calculate a 10% weather loss in bales stacked outside the plastic looks pretty cheap. I have fed bales from an inline wrapper and thought that the quality was inferior to the individual wrapped bales. This was likely caused by several mouse holes in the plastic that allowed air to the whole row. If a hole gets put in these only one bale is affected.
To remove, a sharp knife and open it up like a bag of fibreglass insulation.
I would think in your area a recycling depot would take all you had. We have no facility here so it goes to the dump.

We try to bale at about 30% moisture but if the weather is real unpredictable we have baled at 50% + right behind the cutter. You are just handling more water and heavier bales. These bales were cut one day, baled the next and wrapped within 24 hrs of baling.
We have baled oats at 72% moisture as it was impossible to leave it. Cattle seem to enjoy the higher moisture forage better.

As long as it isn't actually raining we don't stop for weather although with our machinery limitations production gets cut in half.
 
gcreekrch, I see you are running a McHale wrapper have you ever seen the McHale double spike handler for your loader? We had one in Scotland and it was the most used tool on the farm we could do everything with it. You can handle wrapped and unwrapped bales with the same attachment, also two bales at once and big squares, lift tote bags etc etc. Check them out at the following site. It's the second one - the 691 I'm talking about.
http://orkneytoolhire.co.uk/orkney_agricultural_sales/mchale_PDF/Bale_Handling_Range_200207_1.pdf
 
Wrapping is very popular here. I was always told to get them wrapped within 6 hours after baling. Cornell's Pro Dairy has a CD-Rom with lots of information on making Baelage. There are some places in Canada that will recycle the plastic. Cornell is doing some work on doing it here in the North East, but we don't really have any options at this time.
 
The bale hugger keeps you from punturing the plastic. If you do make a hole in the plastic duck tape works well to seal it back up. The bale spear works great for feeding and makes it easier to cut the plastic off when feeding. I figure my plastic cost around 3 dlollars a bale plu you have machinery and diseil cost. If the spring of the year making haylage gives you the ability to get the 1st crop and the 2nd growing. It also works great in the fall when you do not have drying time to make hay.
 
As long as we have wrapped within 24 hrs we have seen no loss of quality.

Ben or Pat, have either of you ever baled any in the rain. Made that mistake once. Feeding 3000 lb ice cubes in the winter was not a happy experience. I've often wondered how much energy the cows burnt up thawing that feed out in their bellies. :D
We were feeding hay also and luckily had only made about 70 bales like this.
 
I am not sure the plastic is really that expensive when you consider the labour, and equipment required for pit silage. Is the individual wrapper as fast as the tubeline type?
 
RSL said:
I am not sure the plastic is really that expensive when you consider the labour, and equipment required for pit silage. Is the individual wrapper as fast as the tubeline type?
Click to expand...

I am sure there are a lot better operators than me. We haul the bales to the stackyard and line them up in a row with 6 to 8 ft of space between. I can wrap about 20 to 25 bales an hr in this fashion. Wrapping in the field leaves the chance of damage from stubble, birds and more handling.

One thing of interest, in 2007 we had a wet August and wrapped nearly every bale we made in the field. Until they were stacked the ravens would not leave them alone. The bales looked like Tuck Tape appaloosas by the time we were able to stack them. Once piled the birds left them alone.
Not sure why they were such fair game in the field and not in the stack.
 
gcreekrch said:
RSL said:
I am not sure the plastic is really that expensive when you consider the labour, and equipment required for pit silage. Is the individual wrapper as fast as the tubeline type?
Click to expand...

I am sure there are a lot better operators than me. We haul the bales to the stackyard and line them up in a row with 6 to 8 ft of space between. I can wrap about 20 to 25 bales an hr in this fashion. Wrapping in the field leaves the chance of damage from stubble, birds and more handling.

One thing of interest, in 2007 we had a wet August and wrapped nearly every bale we made in the field. Until they were stacked the ravens would not leave them alone. The bales looked like Tuck Tape appaloosas by the time we were able to stack them. Once piled the birds left them alone.
Not sure why they were such fair game in the field and not in the stack.
Click to expand...

Maybe there were grasshoppers on them? We tend not to have problems with birds on the tubes, but should livestock get into the hay yard the tuck tape takes a lickin'. Gotta keep the deer and elk out too, or it's a disaster.
 
Quite a few dairies down this way put it up like this but they refer to it as silage. Works well but takes seems to take a lot of equipment to do it right. When they open it up to feed it about 30 gallons of "juice" runs out of the plastic. The cows love it and it helps with milk production in the hot weather. Have you figured your overall cost per roll for cutting, raking, baling, wrapping and moving to feeding area ?
 
Cal said:
That's all interesting. Can I ask how much the machine costs?
Click to expand...

They are worth 20-25,000 new, depending on what options you want. We got this one in 2004 from a discouraged rich guy who was selling out and leaving at any cost. The wrapper had not had 50 bales across it and we paid 14,000. It has all the bells and whistles and has been problem free.
 
when we bought our tubeline the mchale wrapper and handler were about 2000 dollars cheaper {2004}the big difference we felt would be the extra plastic on the end of every bale as we do not have to move the hay more than a mile within our place we opted for the tubeline and have been happy with the feed that comes out.we have done over 1200 bales.this year we only did 12 as we had perfect weather conditions for hay.
 

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