baling cornstalks

Agman

I will put it in the Using your Tractor & Crop Talk forum since it is much less busy and won't disappear into the back pages near so quick.....

This stuff is really promising in my opinion.....

Our neighbor uses an Avco Cut/ditioner to make windrows for his 530 Deere but we just ran across the field without doing anything to it. It keeps some of the stover on the ground to prevent erosion but takes twice as long to make a bale. With the stacker, we skipped every other pass for the same reason.

We only used stover for bedding. The cattle ate what they wanted and laid on the rest. I prefer it over straw or old hay because it literally falls apart on its own when bedding the pens and is very easy to scoop back up at the end of winter with a material bucket on a skid steer.

Nothin' will get your blood movin' any better than spendin' a day movin' a herd up to 9 or 10 miles across country to the next field.

Plus the feed!!!! My gosh, why waste all that feed?

Allan

Of course noone arounf here does it this way YET, but this is what I do to experiment.....

I either use a sickle mower and cut the stalks then use my forage harvester to pick them up - or if I don't mind missing more I just run the forage harvester down the standing rows - I have better luck with the windrow pickup than the corn head -

I am learning a good process - still in the testing phase - but it does show promise....

I am learning what moisture levels to use, how the system works, what to do with the product, etc....

one nice thing about this way - the cobs that the cattle don't like - hardly ever get picked up - the stalks all get chopped (some in large pieces because i don't have a recutter screen installed at the moment)

just take out the nospam and the period
cwlwrsn@iw.nospam.net

--->Paul

Now, I know I'm a foolish old sot and completely out of touch with the new ways of doing things nowadays, but I gotta tell ya, I think baling cornstalks is about as far out of the realm of reality as you can get.

First off, how would a guy ever pick up the "good stuff"? Namely, those lost ears and shelled corn? This is what you're after.

For my money, take 2 hours, throw an electric fence around the field and turn the cattle in there. Makes one heck of a pasture! When they have that field slicked up, go on to the next.

Just my view and stated as such,

Allan

Want some good fiber/ filler & a bit of energy from the shucks & leaves.

Here in Minnesota, you are often combining until & after the first lasting snowfall. I happen to graze 1/4 of my stalks, but it's rare here - too much chance of snow covering them all, and then you are _really_ up a creek scambling for feed..... I suppose this is not a problem in your climate, but i feel real fortunate if I can graze until Thanksgiving, and it is very, very rare to make it until Christmas.

So, you run a flail chopper (common name is stalk chopper or shredder) after the combine, some have shrouding to form a windrow, most follow with a side or wheel rake, keep the windrow smallish, and go baling. Some do small squares, most round bale, a few are doing large squares now. The NH chain balers are real populare for this, less feeding problems on those. The newest round balers are pretty good at handling it too. The Stackhand loaf makers work really well for this.

The shredded stalks aren't all that hard on the baler. A few just follow the combine & collect the husks in the center rows without chopping, but that is hard on the pickup. And JD, maybe others, have a flail chopping attachment that goes on in front of the pickup of the round baler, all-in-one machine.

Then you have feed & bedding for the winter months. Relying on grazing is a risky venture - one year it lasted exactly 3 days after I got the wire up - we got a 20+ inch snow & that was it for the year, snow never went away.

--->Paul

There it is again, that darned reginonal thing. Can't imagine 20" of snow and then it staying all winter. That would really be the exception here.

I've watched a lot of these guys "graze" those fields down 'til you'd swear there was nothing but dirt there. Renting out stalks is a big thing here.

Who'd a thunk it, :>)

Allan

Have a peat slough here that grows good corn when it doesn't drown out. But if you get the wrong brand of corn in it, 30% is laying on the ground in fall.....

--->Paul

My critters are on their second week out there. I figure it was worth the effort if they get 7 days; really need to get 3 weeks to make it pay; and 4 weeks or more is really cool.

I try to plant a little oats with clover & turnips mixed in, and let them graze that earlier - but with crop rotation only really works every other year... These things are rare aound here, but gotta have some fun farming, can't _just_ be in it for the big bucks. ;)

It is interesting to see what is common or onheard of in other regions of the country. :)

--->Paul