Three ways that taking earlier first-cut silage can help
22 January 2025
There seems to have been a theme emerging over recent years. Namely, that farmers who take their first cut of grass silage early, for example in April or early May, can end up better off.
We often saw this in 2024, but we’ve seen it in other years, too.
Here are some of the ways it can help.
1. Higher energy grass
Typically, grass starts heading around 21 May. So if you’re planning to take first-cut in say mid-May, you can see that even a short, weather-induced delay can easily push grass into a post-heading situation and lead to a more stemmy sward.
After heading, we know that grass digestibility falls by about 0.5% a day, and grass that’s more stemmy becomes more difficult to consolidate, which can create problems with fermentation and heating in the clamp.
Bringing first-cut forward can avoid each of these issues at a stroke.
2. Old growth cleared out
Often, we seem to have mild winters nowadays, with grass growth never truly stopping. If grass is allowed to continue growing until mid-May or later before cutting, there’s a high chance this will lead to increased quantities of dead or dying tissue in the sward base.
Clearly, this grass isn’t going to be the best quality. But it’s also likely to contain a lot of unwanted bacteria, which affect how well the silage ferments.
If an early first-cut is taken, it clears out this old, overwintered growth, leaving fresher, more nutritious grass for the next cut.
3. Better logistics
Maintaining this approach of taking each cut slightly earlier over the season, and thereby increasing from maybe two to three cuts, or three to four, offers other benefits as well.
Indeed, it doesn’t mean you’ll harvest less grass over the season. It can actually produce more total bulk. But it does mean that each individual cut is likely to be lighter. And since lighter cuts wilt faster than heavier ones, there’s less chance of being caught with mown grass lying in the field if it rains.
Also, having different cutting dates to other farmers increases the chance of your contractor being available on the day that you want them.
And if the quality of one cut is compromised by the weather during the season, it will represent a smaller proportion of the total amount of grass silage made.
Amanda Clements can be contacted at Volac on 07773 667902