Hay shortage solutions

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ROMAX

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Joined
Apr 12, 2008
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1,233
Location
kintore,ontario, canada
I havent decided if i'm smart or totally insane,with low hay production this year i have resorted to picking up the grass mowed down in the ditches,by the township.It sure has the neighbors looking weird at me.Years ago i probably would have told my dad where to go if he suggested picking grass up out of the ditch,my how things change when its you paying the bills.
 

worthabit

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Joined
Mar 5, 2008
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601
Location
prince edward island Canada
When we were around 9 or 10 we would put the lawn clippings in garbadge bags and make silage.  Hay is short here as well. I cut 30 ac of second cut last week and got 12 bales. We have been feeding hay for  2 weeks.
 
M

maineshorthorn

Guest
bryan6807 said:
I know some guys are planting turnips now for the cattle to graze on late.

will they grow w/o moisture?  Around here, if I didn't have irrigation, I wouldn't' chance it. 
 

justintime

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May 26, 2007
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4,346
Location
Saskatchewan Canada
Lots of ditches get cut and baled here in Western Canada. I used to cut all I could find but since we have had several good hay crops, I only do a few ditches close to the farm, just to clean it up a little. I baled 35 big round bales off of less than a mile of ditches this year. I could have baled a few hundred more. I used to cut and bale any ditch that I could travel in, but now I only do ditches by paved roads as there is no dust in it... just a few beer cans and tossed coffee cups and burger wrappers!

When it is dry, every bale... and any bale counts!
 

justintime

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May 26, 2007
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4,346
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Saskatchewan Canada
If you were to get some good rains soon I would chance seeding some Millet. It grows fast and you can cut it in 5- 6 weeks after seeding it. I remember seeding millet in late July after a rain in a very tough drought year and we baled it in early September. It made excellent feed and the cows loved it.... and it helped get us through to the following spring.
 

cpubarn

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May 24, 2007
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674
Location
Sheffield,IA
justintime said:
If you were to get some good rains soon I would chance seeding some Millet. It grows fast and you can cut it in 5- 6 weeks after seeding it. I remember seeding millet in late July after a rain in a very tough drought year and we baled it in early September. It made excellent feed and the cows loved it.... and it helped get us through to the following spring.

Sounds like a helpful suggestion.  I haven't had any experience in dry weather and any help from those with some experience is great.  It helps make good, thought out decisions.  We have gotten rains of late, but it hasn't been the most fun just watching it melt away all summer..

Any other tips seeding millet?
 

coyote

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Jun 15, 2007
Messages
499
One thing we have done is collect the chaff from the combine. We use to haul it home and feed it with an electric wire but lately we have just let the cows eat it out in the fields.
 

justintime

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May 26, 2007
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4,346
Location
Saskatchewan Canada
Millet is easy to seed, as it is a small seed and we used to just blow it onto the field with a Valmar spreader and then harrow the field. We could seed and harrow a 100 acre field in a few hours.  We have also used an old steel wheeled drill that sat in a fence corner here for decades. We pulled it out, oiled the chains and cleaned out the seed box and it worked great. I'm pretty sure you could seed it in a variety of different ways. It should be seeded shallow and don't stand too long in one spot or it will grow up inside your pant legs!!

Another choice may be sorghum- sudangrass. We have seeded it as late as July 20th after a rain and got a good cut of feed. It is sweet and the cows go crazy for it. I have also seeded it and let the cows graze it in the fall. It is best if you can get it off the field before a frost because it goes pretty flat once it is frozen. In the 80s and 90s we sold sorghum- sudangrass seed and my parents won trips to Florida and to Cancun for top sales in Western Canada. We have not had severe drought like that since then so we have not seeded it since. In 1988 our sorghum -sudangrass was 6 inches high on July 1st. We had a good rain on July 6th and a few showers after that, and it was 5-6 foot when we cut it in late August. My dad put a large stake in the ground and marked it in inches, and it was growing at 3 inches a day. One hot day after a shower it actually grew over 4 inches in a single day. The thing about sorghum sudangrass I liked was if it got dry, it would go dormant and it looked like it was almost dead. When it rained it immediately started to grow again. It is not very high energy but has decent protien and it is a lot better feed than snowballs and northwest wind.
 

chiangus

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Mar 27, 2009
Messages
461
I have bought up as much hay as I can but still short, same problem last year.  Just no yields.
 

BadgerFan

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Jul 30, 2009
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we've used sorghum-sudan also only in grazing.  Anyone ever attempted to make it into dry hay?  Might have to cut it more often than your lawn? :)
 

HAB

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Apr 6, 2010
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862
Location
North Dakota
BadgerFan said:
we've used sorghum-sudan also only in grazing.  Anyone ever attempted to make it into dry hay?  Might have to cut it more often than your lawn? :)

We have with a discbine.  Laid it out as wide as possible, and hoped for a couple of hot non humid days.  Most of the time the rerowth will be 6-8 inches tall by the time you can get the windrows baled.  If you get a shot of rain on it once cut...higher a chopper, or bale it wet and wrap them.
 

sackshowcattle

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May 17, 2011
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81
Location
colorado
make sure your careful with the sudex ( sorghum-sudan) I don't know if its just this state or a product of the plant but it can be very high nitrate.  We either cut it and test till its at good levels to bale or wait for a hard frost before pasturing or cutting and baling. As long as levels are safe great feed that grows fast. Has a sweet taste cattle will eat it before hay or grass, Its also easy to find them if they get out mine run strait to the stack if we have any that year.
 

shorthorngirl2010

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Apr 25, 2008
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321
Location
McCook, Nebraska
sackshowcattle said:
make sure your careful with the sudex ( sorghum-sudan) I don't know if its just this state or a product of the plant but it can be very high nitrate.  We either cut it and test till its at good levels to bale or wait for a hard frost before pasturing or cutting and baling. As long as levels are safe great feed that grows fast. Has a sweet taste cattle will eat it before hay or grass, Its also easy to find them if they get out mine run strait to the stack if we have any that year.

Same concerns in Southwest Nebraska. We just got through swathing one pivot of sorghum-sudan & averaged around 900 ppm nitrates & a field of dryland s-s that averaged over 2200 ppm.. going to have to grind & mix accordingly... Guys around here also do the turnips under a pivot, but we've turned to putting in triticale in the ground in the fall & letting the cows graze that all winter & into spring to somewhat lessen what we have to feed at the bunk; knock on wood, have yet to have any problems with that...
-Sam
 
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