Green Dry Dusty Haylage

Ambers Echo

Ambers Echo

Still wittering on
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13 October 2017
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Just ordered a bale and opened it up. It is very green and very dry. When you pull flakes off huge clouds of dust fill the air - genuinely hard to breathe and triggering coughing/sneezing - in me that is. |I dampened it for the horses. I have never known haylage like this. It is normally dampish and dense and sweet smelling.

I fed it last night as had no alternatives and they ate it very happily but should I be concerned? And how much do I feed? It is so dry that the haynet weighs nothing and I can't gauge what they need.
 
My haylage is very dry which I was expecting due to the weather but there is no dust, I would be wary about feeding it if there is so much dust, if you have to use it then soak to remove the worst, mine are actually eating it fairly slowly as it needs a fair bit of chewing and seem very content with less than I would usually be giving them.
 
Ok that's reassuring. Yes I'll carry on dampening it to reduce the dust. Does it being green matter? I don't really know much about hay/haylage. I just buy it and feed it!
 
It will be greener than normal because it dried so fast in the heat and should be really good quality but yours has somehow become dusty which is a shame as the weather was perfect for making it.
 
What is the dust? How does it become dusty? I've literally never given haylage production a moment's thought before but it would be useful to be a little less clueless!
 
It could be dried plant matter - the haylage dried too fast and the surface of the grass just rubbed away in baling, storage and movement. It could be mud / soil if the haylage was still curing and there was a rain storm; or if the cutting baldes were too low and tore up soil as well as stem. It could be dried remnants of chemicals used to cure it - if chemicals were used. Not all farmers do. It could come from other organic matter included in the bale which has just disintegrated. Any which way not the greatest to inhale if you can avoid it!
 
Many of us will be experiencing 'wrapped hay' rather than haylage this year. Purely due to the summer we had. Mine has come in too dry and whilst not truly dusty there certainly is a degree of dust in the first couple of wraps. Further into the bale there is no dust but it is far more hay than haylage.

I put a power hose through it before feeding and have reverted to hay thoroughly soaked for the one with wind issues. My contractor tells me the majority of haylage will be dry this year. Having said that, I was on a yard recently with haylage made from river meadow pasture and it was fabulous proper haylage.
 
Is the risk of botulism lower with the drier wrapped hay type haylage does anyone know? I've started feeding lightly soaked hay recently instead but curious as the hay will run out eventually and we'll be onto the haylage. It's not like we've not fed haylage for years and years with no problems but just curious really.
 
Ambers Echo said:
What is the dust? How does it become dusty? I've literally never given haylage production a moment's thought before but it would be useful to be a little less clueless!
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I would imagine it is bits of forage that are so dry they are brittle and break up into tiny dust like particles. Unlikely to be fungal spores whih are the ones that do the most damage.
 
PapaverFollis said:
Is the risk of botulism lower with the drier wrapped hay type haylage does anyone know? I've started feeding lightly soaked hay recently instead but curious as the hay will run out eventually and we'll be onto the haylage. It's not like we've not fed haylage for years and years with no problems but just curious really.
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Botulism is a risk factor in damp haylage or silage when it has been cut low to the soil. My haylage was almost dry enough to be hay, just baled and wrapped a day early. Silage is worst.
 
I was given some like that this year! Exactly like that! Just literally fell apart and dusty, very dusty. Looked nice and actually smelt lovely (hay not haylage)
It had been cut off a very thin crop and literally dried and baled in 24 hours.
No good for me as I’d wanted haylage for a bad dust allergy but I’d have used it soaked for the other horses.
 
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