Round bales and being exposed to the elements?

[kuntrygirl]

We use round bales mostly. We do keep a few square bales around for convenience.

FIL just built a large shed, three sided, to keep round bales in. They are stack five bales high (we usually put up several hundred, with a good hay season yeilding over a thousand round bales). Before we had the shed, we would row them, end to end, with a second row stacked in the "rut" on the top, again end to end. They would be covered with a large heavy tarp and weighted with tires, in direct sunlight. We never had a problem with mold, and our hay stayed nice and clean and without mold.

If you start with good quality hay that is properly cured, and properly stored, you wont have any issues.

A few of the pastures dont finish a round bale very quickly, only needing a new bale every month or so. For these pastures, there is a covered hay area, with a roof, and the bale is rolled open in front of the hay stanchions.

Pastures that go thru a bale a week, have an exposed hay feeder.

As for the Salmonella, good husbandry, a clean farm and good vaccinations go a long way. Barns are kept clean, and outside hay feeding stations are rotated as needed.
Feeding areas with a lot of wasted hay are cleaned and those critters are given lass hay.

With a large herd, and large amounts of hay field, square bales are not an option for us. We do sell alot of the hay that we produce. Our method must be working pretty good, because we always run out of hay before we run out of buyers. ALL of the people we sold to this past season were repeat customers.

Can you post a pic of the shed that you built? We just built a VERY small cover to protect the hay from the elements.

 

[redtailgal]

Yeah, I'll post a pic, but gimme a lil while. I'll have to go out and feed later, and I'll try to get it then.

 

[kuntrygirl]

Yeah, I'll post a pic, but gimme a lil while. I'll have to go out and feed later, and I'll try to get it then.

Sounds good. In the meantime, here is what we built a couple weeks ago. It's not big, not much but it keeps the square bales protected from the rain.

 

[redtailgal]

Sorry it took me so long. Its beginning to act like spring around here.

I was able to get pic of the shed while it was empty, just hauled the last of last years hay the other day. It's time to fill her back up!

ANyway, the newest hayshed. We have several scattered about, but this is by far the nicest and most practical. The red tractor attachment in the back is a seeder, the long slanted dark thing is the hay slider that we use to get square bales into the hayloft. The yellow thing is an open livestock trailor, and then of course, the gooseneck trailor. The main shed is the upper level. This lean-to was built as an addition, next to the retaining wall, so that when the shed was full, there would be a place to park the semi and trailer.

This pic is the front, and main part of the shed. For a size perspective, the large trailor attaches to a semi (18 wheeler) , and you can see the one bale of hay that ended up with busted twine in the very back. The roof is regular roofing and the sides are panels from a large greenhouse.

 

[kuntrygirl]

Sorry it took me so long. Its beginning to act like spring around here.

I was able to get pic of the shed while it was empty, just hauled the last of last years hay the other day. It's time to fill her back up!

ANyway, the newest hayshed. We have several scattered about, but this is by far the nicest and most practical. The red tractor attachment in the back is a seeder, the long slanted dark thing is the hay slider that we use to get square bales into the hayloft. The yellow thing is an open livestock trailor, and then of course, the gooseneck trailor. The main shed is the upper level. This lean-to was built as an addition, next to the retaining wall, so that when the shed was full, there would be a place to park the semi and trailer.

http://www.backyardherds.com/forum/uploads/2952__dsc0019.jpg

This pic is the front, and main part of the shed. For a size perspective, the large trailor attaches to a semi (18 wheeler) , and you can see the one bale of hay that ended up with busted twine in the very back. The roof is regular roofing and the sides are panels from a large greenhouse.

http://www.backyardherds.com/forum/uploads/2952__dsc0020.jpg

WOW!!! That is totally awesome!

You must have a lot of hay to store.

Thank you for taking the time to post and share. Everything looks great!

 

[Bunny-kids]

I may have missed it, but in case you are putting round bales out for your animals, or storing them outside, make SURE you have them standing on the round side. They should not be lying on a flat side with the round making the outside "wall" (I hope I explained that well enough) or rain can get down inside and ruin it very quickly. You want the water to run off the outside.

I used a just put out a round bale at a time the first year, and there was too much waste. So I used a hayring the next year, and my goats would get inside and mess up the hay, and still wasted a lot. So I welded on some extra bars. Two of them still managed to squeeze in, and the kids can still get in, and they like to climb on it and sleep in it, all the while pooping and peeing, and it still wasted too much. Hay is SO expensive here this year due to last year's drought, that now I'm just storing the hay and pulling off flakes to take to them. I can store about 6-7 round bales in the main passage in the old barn, but I keep one tarped next to the pasture fence so I only have to carry it a few feet to dump it in a feeder for the animals. The tarp isn't REALLY necessary, but this hay is so light and fluffy compared to what I'm used to that I think it helps hold it together as I peel it off, too. It does make for extra work, and I take them hay 2x a day, which is turning out to be plenty now that the pasture is greening up, but I am not sure I'd want to do that in winter with the hay in a separate barn and the animals inside most of the day.