Plastic wrapped bales.

What is the thinking behind plastic wrapped bales? Why can't bales be stacked in buidlings, like in the old days? I don't know what the trend is in Alberta and Sask, but locally here in BC, there are acres and acres of white and green wrapped bales, square and round.

I don't want to point a finger at anyone here and shout 'environmentally unfriendly', but I do flinch when I wonder what happens with all that plastic? WIth seeing all that out there, I figure I don't have to feel guilty on the days I forget my fabric shopping bags. I'm sure it's all recyclable but I can assure you that I have never, not once, seen a farmer with a tied bundle hauling his used plastic anywhere. Instead, in the fall and winter you see fires with a characteristic black smoke that is NOT wood smoke!

Obviously the small bales I buy are not wrapped. BUt I have never clearly understood the reason for wrapping. If the thinking is that it saves the farmer from having to build buildings, then I have to ask, at what price to the rest of us? One building can store hay for many, many years, but each piece of plastic is one use only. I look forward to undestanding what the thinking is behind plastic bales. (we used to tell our daughter they were giant marshmallows growing on marshmallow farms)

I tried telling a friend's kid it was a sugar cube farm but she was smarter than me.

I have no idea what's behind it either so look forward to hearing more.

You are not alone Uno, we built a big hay shed last year and just added about 100 more square bales with sisal (I think, brown natural fibre) twine today. No plastic for us! We even have one of those bale wagons that picks and stacks the bales and a bale elevator! No cab on our massy 35 or 65 tractors either. Looks like a circa 1960's farm at out place during haying!

We tell are gkids they are giant marshmellows. A rainy year like this in BC means lots of plastic wrapped bales. Hay can be baled wet and then wrapped. Inside the plastic coating the hay ferments which increases its caloric value or at least makes the cows happy. In days gone by we hauled the hay to a silo, but on today's labour poor farms it is easier to make marshmellows. Some farms use a huge pit where the hay is dumped, packed down and covered in plastic.

Uno those bales you see in fields wrapped in white plastic are not to avoid building a hay storage building. Those bales are high moisture bales. The bales are most often done in years when weather isn't cooperating like this year. The bales are similar to silage. The bales need to be wrapped to prevent them from getting moldy.

Also most farm plastics aren't accepted at most recycling places. The recycling companys say it costs them too much money to recycle that plastic. I am sure farmers would choose another more enviromentally friendly option if there was one available to them.

rosewood wrote:We tell are gkids they are giant marshmellows. A rainy year like this in BC means lots of plastic wrapped bales. Hay can be baled wet and then wrapped. Inside the plastic coating the hay ferments which increases its caloric value or at least makes the cows happy. In days gone by we hauled the hay to a silo, but on today's labour poor farms it is easier to make marshmellows. Some farms use a huge pit where the hay is dumped, packed down and covered in plastic.

I assumed they were marshmallow farms as well.

Good explanation rosewood. Even in dry times, they still bale and wrap to keep the moisture in to begin the fermenting process. It doesn't benefit the horse people, just the cow people.

Hm, off topic, but what bugs me about plastic, is that so many grocery stores still give out the bags, but you have to pay at Zellers, Shoppers and such, that is just not right. Love you girl, beautiful days, with the same beautiful nights. CynthiaM.

It's called silage out here and is definately cow feed. High possibilities of botulism due to the moisture and should not be fed to horses. It is not the same thing as a round bale which also has risks of botulism if not prepped properly.

Out here the plastic can be taken for recycling. We can also recycle our CLEAN plastic twine. A lady on the Island did a big push for it and even drove around personally to collect the first year. I think it died off due to recycling markets but is now back up again.

We have a lot of mint marshmellows this year...not as much as the original whites, LOL

Off topic as well. Our local AG gives out bags for free and you don't need a deposit for the shopping cart. Being a country bumpkin for a decade I have a terrible time with shopping cart starting with which coin is required and just where do I put the coin. The coin is usually something we don't carrying with us since we have become addicted to plastic debit cards. Just as an aside- plastic money is coming down the tubes shortly.

Back to recycling. Why are only certain kinds of plastic recycled and others not. If you do some research some types of plastic are recycled when they are used in a certian way, but not others. Plastic Baler twine can't be recycled, but most flip top lids for common household containers can be recycled and are made from the same plastic.

Silage has a higher feed value for cattle feeding, plus less is needed, and many cow/calf producers are now going the bag route for economic reasons, feedlots usually still use pits to make silage. Farmers out here also bag grain in the fall after combining out in the fields, it is more cost effective than buying more bins, and more convenient when hauling to the elevator. Lots of plastic being wasted.

So you are telling me I am looking at long tubes of silage? What is the advantage of that over the tried and true bunker of feed with a tarp held down by tires?

Sue

The long tubes are actually a new type of farmer sausage. The plastic wrap hayage comes down to ease of use. The bales still use the same hay conditioner, baler and haandling equipment. The only added equipment is the wrapper. A silage pit takes a different equipment to elevate the hay into a truck and takes a carefully driven tractor to pack down the hay in a pit. To feed cattle the bales takes the same equipment as regular bales. Baling takes one person, but when I helped put up silage it took three- a tractor driver, a truck driver and a second tractor driver packing.

Ah, this is good. So basically the stuff in plastic is silage. Back in my youth (when cars had stone wheels) silage was a chopped product that was hauled into in-ground pits that were lined with lumber, not even concrete! I can't remember if my dad covered his or not.

Why is the bagged silage any more convenient than pit stored silage? Most farms already have the equipment to just drive into a pit and pick up a scoop? I'm not getting the bagged convenience. You still have to pick it up and move it to where the cows are. And cut it open, an EXTRA step not required with pit silage.

I cannot imagine the enormous mess it would create if all the farmers lugged their balled up, used plastic to the local recyling depot. It would be a catastrophe! But I am bothered by all that plastic...not judging...just the product of a green campaign that has handed out more guilt than a Sunday sermon!

Edited to say I was typing at the same time as Rosewood. So missed his reply before writing my own.

My understanding is it is to keep the nutrient content up also in the bales. We just have marshmellows here that I have seen in Ontario, they don't seem to wrap the squares round here, big or small, or use green plastic. They use black in England, my guess it is probably because it blocks UV better and doesn't get as warm there.

They individually wrapped some of the late cut bales here for us last Sept as the weather didn't cooperate as well as usual. It is more like a bandage that is wrapped round and round, and doesn't really keep the hay dry, we thought it did.... It's like wearing a bandage instead of clothes, it may look the part from a distance, but close up it's just mummy clothing. We had a left over couple of bales this spring that the hay guy came to get and when they lifted them up, gallons of water came out. There were no holes in them before that, he wraps them where they are to be used from, so as not to perforate and break the seal.

Here in Ontario with the snow and the white bales, you often see them with orange warning paint sprayed on the the of unopened tube or line of them, to warn poor unsuspecting inebriated snow-mobilers They have been recycling the white stuff here for a good 10 years now, you see it at the dump all in one area.

Everyone has already told you it is silage. It can be done many ways, if you are set up for it the chopped is the most economical. The single wrapped bales the most expensive, but these can be sold where the other methods are usually used on farm.

We do the long tubes here as it was not set up for the pits. This allows the the convenience of individual bales, but it is more economic than individually wrapped ones.

In Australia we had very large pits dug into the side of hills. Large squares were stacked and plastic added to the top and then they were buried. These in earth pits would last for years and could be accessed in the next drought. If you did it right you didn`t even have to use the whole pit once you opened it. We has large pits all over the farm and the cattle would just graze on top of them eventually when the grass came back.

We have fed horses haylage. It has to be produced very carefully, not like the cattle product and it smells incredible. Even good cattle feed should have a sweet smell to it. The not so good stuff has a vile smell in my opinion.

It doesn`t really increase the feed value, but it increases the digestibility and utilization of the nutrients.

The plastic is an issue, I am not sure how we get around it.

rosewood wrote: Plastic Baler twine can't be recycled, ...

I know it may only be our area that does...but it can be...it's a matter of finding a facility willing to take it, and it must be clean.

Yup, Silage is basicaly like sauerkraut. And in my opinion..kinda smells like sauerkraut too. Darrell's dad uses both dry round bales and silage to feed his cows..They love the silage and dive right into it! It depends on the year as to how much silage he has. I'm suspecting this year he will be having lots of white marshmallows at his place.

Why is the bagged silage any more convenient than pit stored silage?

individual bags are round bales that are baled with a round baler at a higher moisture content and when wrapped are "ensiled". Fermentation takes place. Very useful when you have 30 or 40 acres of beautiful hay that's not quite ready and the weather forecast is for 3 days of rain.

Sileage tubes are chopped high moisture hay (or corn) blown and packed tightly into these long sausages.

The advantage over pits has to do with "face" exposure once the sileage bag is opened. Pit silos usually have a large "face" or open area when they are opened - which is fine if you have a lot of animals to feed every day. You can continually feed the sileage before the air/oxygen causes it to start to deteriorate - hence the reason that both tubes and pits need to be packed tightly to remove oxygen and aid fermentation. Tubes are very advantageous for smaller farms because the "face" of exposed sileage is much smaller. Therefore, each day's feed can be "fresh" and at it optimum nutrition level for the cows/sheep.

Yes moulds can develop in sileages - even in very good sileage. Sheep are more susceptible to these moulds than cattle - listeriosis. However, farmers must weigh the risk vs. benefits. Do I want a decent crop of hay in sileage form or do I want to wait for the rain to stop and bale up crappy dry hay.

Some areas in Ontario do accept the sileage wrap plastic. In fact, I think there is a company that makes recycled lawn furniture and fence posts etc from it. However, recycling companies want it cleaned before drop off. Farmers aren't being lazy when they burn the plastic - they just haven't got the time to wash miles and miles of plastic when recycling companies don't pay them anything for it. Labour and profits are at a premium.

Silage tubes here are round bales put through a machine that wraps them in a continuous sausage. With a bunch of gkids here we have watched this being done countless time on "Mighty Machines".

Dutch Girl wrote:Yup, Silage is basicaly like sauerkraut. And in my opinion..kinda smells like sauerkraut too. Darrell's dad uses both dry round bales and silage to feed his cows..They love the silage and dive right into it!

Do they ever!

We got one for the sheep one fall when their pasture was getting bare. They would stand around it with their heads buried in the bale like ticks. The thing was giving off a fair amount of heat too. You could see it steaming on frosty days. Frost on the ground but the grass seed was germinating on the top of the bale. The sheep must have liked that treat too.

Now I must say those wrapping machines are tres cool!

Sue

I have seen some of those wrapping machines in action too and it's quite a slick operation. A lot more efficient than me trying to wrap a sandwich, yanking and pulling on the plastic wrap, trying to get it to cut on those serated teeth. Only it won't cut, it just stretches then tears, you grate your knuckles open, the plastic wrap sticks itself into a permanent ball after you rip it violently from the non-functioning serated edge, while bleeding and swearing. You try for a second piece and this time you rip even harder, your elbow hits the plate, the sandwich lands on the floor where the dog nabs it and trots off to the porch to eat it at his leisure.

I need a silage wrapper in my kitchen!

I undestood the plastic covering on the big round hale bales is a UV protectant to retain more of the nutrition in the hay.

uno wrote:I have seen some of those wrapping machines in action too and it's quite a slick operation. A lot more efficient than me trying to wrap a sandwich, yanking and pulling on the plastic wrap, trying to get it to cut on those serated teeth. Only it won't cut, it just stretches then tears, you grate your knuckles open, the plastic wrap sticks itself into a permanent ball after you rip it violently from the non-functioning serated edge, while bleeding and swearing. You try for a second piece and this time you rip even harder, your elbow hits the plate, the sandwich lands on the floor where the dog nabs it and trots off to the porch to eat it at his leisure.

I need a silage wrapper in my kitchen!

Yikes Uno, that's grim! You seem to have some issues. Why dont you use waxed paper the old fashioned way. My mom always used waxed. She said it was cheaper and better for the world than plastic. And this was in the 60's/ 70's!

Of course the sticking power of waxed is nonexistant!

Sue

Well Sue, you bring up a good point. Wax lacks in the stick department. But I have lately saved a few of the waxed bags from inside cereal boxes. I stuff food in these, fold the open end shut and secure with a clothespin. Low tech and it looks like someone hung laundry in my fridge, but the bags are multi use where no one re-uses plastic wrap.