Cattle farmers in Grant County cattle farms have experienced a downward trend to prices received for their products at market.  The worldwide pandemic this year created a more dismal outlook as consumer dining perspectives have changed and processing plant delays have created an unbalanced situation of supply and demand at the grocery stores.

Many Grant County cattle farmer have looked toward an effort to further decrease their costs of feeding cattle outside of the growing season.  Cattle on farms in Grant County are typically on feed for 120 to 180 days during the dormant season of pasture forage production.  Farmers looking to decrease their feeding costs and add value to their calves some have elected to turn corn crops into high value feed stuffs for livestock.  As farmers growing silage can grow 3 to 4 times more tons per acre over conventional hay crops.  Over the past year Grant County cattle farmers have ensiled over 450 acres of corn, making silage and by storing it in bags.

Recognizing the changes in farming practices the Grant County Extension District identified that farmers were renting machines outside of the county and losing valuable time in the field transporting the machines nearly 3 hours each way to and from the farms.   The Grant County Extension District lead by the agriculture agent applied for a cost-share grant, received funding and purchased a silage bagger.

This season in the field Grant County’s silage bagger stuffed over 2500 tons of Grant County corn crop and was utilized by 2 out of the county farmers storing the silage into thick walled plastic tubing.  Farmers have realized an increase value in the silage over straight dry hay in % Protein.  Cattle farmers were polled to determine production costs of corn silage average out to $45/ton cost of feed cost with an average production of 18 tons/acre.   Comparatively speaking to convention forage costs of $80/ton of hay and purchased feed supplements that cost at a minimum of $175/ton.   Responding farmers indicated that cattle that fed an incorporated diet of corn silage and stored hay maintained better body condition and weaned calves that were on average 38 lbs/head heavier than cattle that were on fed hay.  

Finally, one farmer that introduced silage to his feeding program in 2020 indicated that to date he has decreased his supplemental feed costs by $3500 at the midpoint of the winter feeding season.   He expects that to hold true for the entire season equating to a cost savings for winter feeding of over $200/head.