The silage test results from the Advantage Beef Programme’s monitor farms have shown a significant variation in dry matter (DM) content.
Speaking to Agriland about the results, ABP Food Group’s Advantage Beef Programme farm liaison team leader Amie Coonan said “a lot of the silage test results this year seem to either have a very high DM [content] or a very low DM [content]”.
She said this is due to when the silage was cut; when a lot of the first cuts were being made around the country she said, there was one very dry week and another very wet week.
“The feed quality of the results don’t seem to be overly impacted by it and most farmers seem happy enough with the protein content and the Dry Matter Digestibility (DMD) of their results.
“On the DM values, if a farmer has extremely wet silage, it could be worth looking at feeding straw along with the silage to add a little more fibre.”
She added that “with very wet silage, you’re not getting that perfect fermentation so you can loose qualities there but there doesn’t seem to be any palatability issues from what I have seen so far, the results seem okay”.
On the other extreme, she said “cattle’s silage intakes can be lower if silage is very dry”.
Silage analysis
Coonan explained that the average DMD of the first-cut silage on the monitor farms was 69.7% and the average DMD of the second-cut silage was 69.4%.
The ABP advantage team is available to take silage and soil samples for all Advantage Beef Programme members.
The average crude protein of both the first and second cuts was 12.3%.
Advantage Beef Programme farm liaison officers:
The highest-quality silage on the monitor farms achieved a DMD of 76.1% and 13.3% protein. The silage was first-cut baled silage made in mid-May on ground that had been reseeded in the past three years.
Coonan explained: “A variety of silage qualities are required on beef farms, especially those with spring-calving suckler cows.
The chart below outlines target silage DMDs for different stock groups:
“Feed dry cows the lower-quality silage on farm, ideally between 64-66% DMD. Overfat cows at calving will lead to hard calvings, retained placentas and milk fever.
“Ensure spring-calving cows receive a good quality pre-calver mineral eight weeks pre-calving at the correct feeding rate, usually 120-150g/head/day.
“Assign the best-quality silage available to cattle that require energy for milk production or liveweight gain such as autumn-calving cows, finishing cattle and weanlings.
“Silage quality has an enormous impact on the level of concentrates required to hit growth targets throughout an animal’s lifetime and doing this will reduce the amount of concentrates required to achieve optimum growth.”
75% of the silage samples from the monitor farms were baled silage and 25% of the silage samples were from pit silage.
About the monitor farms
The ABP Advantage Beef Programme works closely with 10 monitor farmers located throughout the country.
These monitor farms operate a variety of farm enterprises including suckler, dairy and dairy calf to beef.
Advice available through the Advantage Beef Programme includes:
- Nutritional advice based on silage results;
- Fertiliser and soil health plans based on soil sample results;
- Dosing plans based on Faecal Egg Count (FEC) results;
- Grassland management advice relating to grass measuring, reseeding and fertiliser.
The Advantage Beef Programme’s farm liaison team aims to work with these monitor farms as well as Advantage Beef Programme members over the coming years to offer advice on further enhancing their farm business.