How soon can baled silage be fed?

[SteveM]

We feed mainly hay, and mini hesston size wrapped silage which is mainly baled in july.

This year we had a 2nd cut off a couple of acres of grass/clover and have five round bales produced on 9th september.

Being round these will be easiest fed in a ring feeder so would like to use them up in the field before the cows come in for winter.

How long does a wrapped silage or haylage bale take to fement?

[Duncan MacIntyre]

Certainly not before Monday Steve, some of us are off the DCS AGM across the sea.

Duncan, off to get the first of two ferries!

[marcus]

Hi..
I never feed big bales until they have had at least six weeks, if you feed before it tends to go straight through them. Hope this helps.

[Broomcroft]

I thought it was OK (for cattle) straight away, but I've not fed earlier than about 2-3 weeks and that was more like haylage.

[SteveM]

Tidied up our hay fields end of September so have eight roughly 3ft diameter round bales of silage this year, hoping to still have the cows out end of November so we can use them up in ring feeder in field, guessing they wont be too easy to handle into troughs being short grass and fairly heavy if kept till after the cows have come in for winter.

[Rob R]

I started reading this thinking the whole thread was new (until I got to the bit about the AGM) - didn't read the date part of the year!