Haylage question

[Cazza525]

Right peeps, had a large bale of haylage delivered today from local farmer...........long story but i'm getting it free throughout the winter.

Only thing is , I thought haylage was wrapped !!

This is basically a large round bale which has got netting round it??

I wasn't there when it was being delivered but I'm kinda flummoxed!! Is this normal?

It smells lovely btw.........!

Anyone shed any light on it??

 

[chevs]

Maybe he unwrapped it for you?? It is usually wrapped in netting, like hay then wrapped in plastic. He possible unwrapped it whilst in was on loader before dropping it down. If it smells nice, is not heating up from the middle out and looks good thats probably what he did but i would phone him to make sure.

 

[PennyJ]

Mine gets unwrapped before he delivers it. So he can check its a "good" bale before he drops it off... All I have to do is unwrap and dispose of the netting once its here.

 

[bigboyrocky]

A friend (very naive but with lots of money) had a round bale of what he thought was haylage wrapped in netting, and after asking me to look after his horses whilst he was away i found white mould right in the centre of it and it turned out to be sylage! Luckily he had lots of money, and after i gave him a bit of a lecture, he ordered in about 100 small bale bagged haylage bags

Just check with the farmer its not sylage that wasnt rich enough for another use or something like that :/ but if its haylage and looks and smells okay then it should be absoloutly fine to use!

 

[JamesEarwaker]

Id also just check before using too, if it smelt nice then most probably the case that hes un-wrapped it and took the plastic away as farmers have means of disposeing of the plastic where as some stables dont.
As i said tho just check as said above it could be silage, farmer can easily mix up round bales of haylage and silage that are both wrapped in black plastic, both will still smell lovely but if your not in the no then hard to tell apart!!!

 

[Cazza525]

How do I tell apart then??

 

[oln]

Both would have to have been wrapped in plastic. The difference is haylage has a higher dry matter to silage. If it isnt mouldy and smells nice just check it looks as dry as you would expect haylage to be and hasnt had additives used on it which arent horse freindly.