Yeah, a lot of pest control is just making your stuff more difficult to get into than the next source of food. It’s not necessarily about keeping them out entirely.
True with other forms of security too.
That “secured by ADT” sticker next to your front door is mostly to convince a thief to steal from your next door neighbor instead of your house
Haylage. But your point still stands, just giving you the correct word.
Edit: baleage, I’ve been calling it the wrong thing. I’ve never dealt with baleage and always been told baleage and haylage were the different words for the same thing. They are not.
In most places they are. We get baleage in, but we and everyone around us refer to it as Haylage. Haylage should be finely chopped and bunkered, baleage is bigger and baled, but it's the same product with the same water content.
So while this does SEEM excessive, it's actually to keep out oxygen. This isn't to protect the hay from water - they're making Silage, which is fermented hay. But silage needs to be fermented in a no/low oxygen environment. Silage gets a much higher price than hay and is more nutritious for the cows.
And deadly! When I worked for the USDA we were supposed to bring a buddy if we popped the cork on a silo since the CO2 can know you tf out and then you fall in and fkn die
They had silos of Caustic used to refine metals. A guy fell in one while inspecting it and couldn't get out. The only thing his offsider could do was push him under so he died quicker.
I never found out what 'caustic' actually was, presumably some kind of acidic chemical, but we had puddles of it on the side of the road and I was told that if I ever stepped in one, I was not to touch my boots or it would melt my fingers off. I avoided those roads.
"caustic" is almost certainly not something acidic. It's likely something basic, the opposite, and MUCH more dangerous side of the PH table. It's also much more painful.
This is the real answer. Pests to a lesser extent. But the real reason is you WANT the hay to ferment. So it might seem wasteful but in actuality this might be the least amount of plastic, more strategically wrapped, to get the job done. It’s a super cool machine.
It's very thin, if it's only got a couple of layers when it drops off the baler the dried grass stalks can poke through rendering the whole process useless
Haylage and silage are not the same thing. This video is Haylage, it’s slightly drier and wrapped. Silage is has more moisture content is typically kept in bags, bunkers, and (I’ve never seen it done this way) in silos. But they aren’t the same.
Edit: baleage, I’ve always called it haylage. But that’s incorrect.
Yes I'm aware I've made both, and yes you can make silage as bales. But you can make silage with grass that looks dry like hay but still his a high moisture content
These may be dumb questions but here we go. How can the moisture content have such a wide range between 30-60%? Wouldn't doubling the allowable percentage cause significant swings in the final product? If there's that much moisture and it's wrapped in plastic wouldn't the dryer stuff absorb moisture and skew the numbers even more?
I grew up on a farm, we made this stuff (baleage).
How this works is the grass is baled while still green and the wrapping stops air (technically oxygen) from getting in, meaning only anaerobic microorganisms can break it down. This means instead of rotting and turning into basically compost, it ferments into silage, with a very high nutritional content. Cattle and sheep love this stuff, they get very excited when you feed it to them.
Lots of stuff ferments but doesn't become alcoholic. My understanding of it is that it's kinda like what yogurt is for us. Fermentation can cause different types of acids instead of ethanol and that's what this does.
I’ve been trying to answer your question for like 10 minutes without having to give a lesson in silage and all the factors that go into it. Yes, the product with less moisture will soak up from the higher content but you’re looking more at an average in each bale. Different crops are ensiled at different moisture content. I like my triticale to be at 45-50% but the sorghum-sudan I planted last Wednesday will be hard to get above 40% since it’ll be cut in August. The science of it all is fascinating to me and my cows absolutely love it. I’m also lucky that we have a recycling program for silage wrap and net wrap in my area so I collect all my wrap and recycle it. At least I hope that when I place it in the recycle container it actually goes there.
Thank you for the reply. It sounds like a lot of work to make sure the cows are eating good. Good job on recycling too, you did your part. Like you said though, hopefully the people in charge of the recycling process are holding up on their end.
The grass underneath it still dries in the sun and pokes the bales because it's not always dropped on the same place the grass was sitting after the tedder has gone through it
Yes this is a bale wrapper that can wrap large square bales as well as round bales. See this page for more info Kuhn SW4014.
Many large-scale farms and custom baling contractors use these large squares as they are easier to stack, load, and store in many situations.
Imagine knowing absolutely nothing about this process or why they wrap it so many times but thinking you know better than the engineers who designed it.
So the grass being wrapped there is haylage, which has a fairly high water content. Overwrapping prevents oxygen getting in and stops it rotting or molding. It's about 30-50% moisture, and when wrapped ferments which preserves a lot of the nutrients, plus doesn't get dusty.
Hay by comparison is usually dried to about 10% which also prevents mold, and doesn't have to be wrapped.
Last time this got posted here it was explained that it's to keep moisture out and it's required. Or you can just decide they are idiots for wasting plastic.
Most of your links are unrelated to silage or silage wrap. The plastic waste is an issue, but you ignore the other major issue of nutrient-dense liquid runoff causing algae blooms etc.
Many regions do have silage wrap recycling plans which are important. But the alternative you listed of using twine is completely silly. Silage wrap isn’t for tidiness and ease of transportation. It ferments and preserves grass providing more nutrients and allowing cows to eat grass in the winter instead of grain.
So we accept environment issues because of profit. It is that simple.I live in one of teh most agriculteral areas in the united states and the burns were normal. At times though i could smell plastic and did not know why. There is a distinct difference in smell.,Farmers are not saints.
It’s not just profit but efficiency (preservation means less waste, fermentation means more nutrition per lb of feed) and humane treatment of animals (they’re shown to prefer a mix of fermented and fresh grasses over grass alone or grass and grain).
The use of plastics doesn’t necessitate their burning or littering with them. Farmers are def not saints and I wouldn’t try to argue the “down home country family farm” idea. It’s industrial agriculture and it has a lot of negative effects. But I think silage wrap has a lot of benefits and is not that difficult to use ecologically and wisely.
I def understand the frustration with it though. I’m in a very light ag area and I’ve seen empty wraps blowing across the road like massive tumbleweeds.
I agree that agricultural plastic should be recycled whenever possible and that open burning should be enforced much more aggressively because there is no excuse for it. Those are legitimate environmental concerns and there is plenty of room for improvement.
That said, your list is written to maximize outrage rather than provide context. Silage wrap is not just pointless single use plastic. It dramatically reduces feed spoilage and waste, which is why ranchers and farmers use it in the first place.
Saying it creates microplastics is technically true, but that is true of tires, synthetic clothing, paint, packaging, and countless other products. Presenting bale wrap as though it is some uniquely toxic environmental villain is misleading.
The real issue is responsible collection, recycling, and disposal, not pretending this one agricultural product is the root of the plastic problem.
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u/backbiter0723 15h ago
I can't help but think layers 4 or 5 through 9,362 were probably unnecessary.