Plan Your Winter Feeding Today: Profit From High Quality Home Produced Feeds Tomorrow

Friday 12th July 2009

This is the time of year when local farmers face an important decision regarding winter feeding needs in relation to the forthcoming wheat crop. While wheat is often used purely as part of crop rotation and for the good husbandry of the soil, farmers can also exploit its full potential with some careful early planning and remaining flexible over the harvest period. This approach can reap rewards for the farmer in a significant increase in the quality of the output by the herd.

Farmers face an initial choice of three options: wholecrop, crimp or rolled wheat.

Research shows that mixing forages with whole crop will enhance intake and animal performance. And those who need extra forage to improve the quality or bulk of their grass silage, or whose silage is a bit wet, will benefit from harvesting the wheat as a whole crop. While maize is often the preferred option as a supplement, some farmers are not able to grow maize silage, and for them the whole crop would be an ideal second forage.

Although wholecrop doesn’t yield quite so well as maize and can have lower starch levels, the crop is beneficial in adding fibre to an existing maize-silage ration where required.

The decision to go for wholecrop comes early; farmers will need to commit to this in early July. Naturally, each farm has its own individual situation with regard to the quality of their forage and their local circumstances for producing quality winter feeds. There is no single solution that is right for all. But a quick look at the options can pay dividends in getting the best value from wheat in the winter. The two further options which the farmer can consider, crimp and rolled wheat, can even be switched to if conditions change unexpectedly.

While the farmer might plan for wholecrop, if the conditions change, keeping an open mind and waiting a few weeks can make the difference between poorer quality wholecrop or being able to harvest the wheat later as crimped wheat or as rolled wheat in August. While rolled wheat through a combine harvester is the more traditional method of later harvesting, it is worth considering crimp as this produces starch which is more easily digestible because it is released gradually.

If the farmer has heaps of forage in stock he may not need the whole crop and would benefit from the nutritional balance provided by the extra starch in the ration from grain acquired by harvesting rolled wheat.

The key question to ask at this time of the year is how are the animals going to be fed in the winter? It’s a question that is well worth considering now, given the problems caused by last year’s weather which turned a considerable amount of wheat harvesting into a salvage operation.

The rewards for careful planning are that each farm will get as much value out of its home grown forage as possible. Cornwall Farmers can help by providing a comprehensive range of services, products and advice, seeds, feeds and supplements to balance and maximise forage utilisation;  additives to preserve them, mixer wagons to feed them, iron work to put the feed in; plus sheeting and clamps, right through to top quality machinery at harvest time.

Profit from forage with Cornwall Farmers.

Do talk to Cornwall Farmers for advice in all these areas by contacting: Dr Robin Hawkey on 07770 816581; Tom Mann on 07901 854477 or Andy Hawken on 07901 854463, and for agricultural machinery, contact Andrew Nicholas on 07881 507840.