Silage Quality
With silage making up approximately a third of the pasture component of the goat’s diet in a typical NZ dairy goat system, its quality is important.
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Managing Silage for Dairy Goats
Silage Quality
Managing grass quality to achieve high quality silage is a combination of knowledge and timing (i.e. working around workloads and weather factors). Ideally the silage would be cut at the same optimum length for feeding fresh. This will mean you will get less bales each round but the quality will be higher and the regrowth better, meaning you will get additional cuts later in the season.
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Silage management also includes the accurate recording of the number of bales made and their quality / approximate moisture content. If using a stack rather than bales, take note of the paddock numbers harvested from and approximate tonnage.
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Post baling, bales can be allocated a number from 1 – 4 to indicate
their quality or with the paddock location they were made from.
The best quality bales should be used during peak lactation and
poorer quality and/or drier ones for the dry period.
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Mouldy Silage
White mould is a common issue in silage and because it is slightly sweet, goats will actively seek to eat it if given the opportunity to do so. Agriplastics recommends ensuring that the dry matter of the silage does not exceed 60%, that the bales are well condensed and properly wrapped to ensure the fermentation process occurs correctly. Baling grass that is very mature, and pasture from land that was previously in maize were both cited as a further possible causes of white mould. If a bale is heavily contaminated with mould, discard the whole bale (feed to your dry stock). Small outer patches may be able to be removed and the rest fed to your goats but take care not to feed to young stock or pregnant does.
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