Silage’s role in grazing systems

Jul 11, 2024

Mixed grass pasture waiting to become silage.

Silage production in Australia has more than doubled since the early 1990s.

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Silage provides an opportunity to store high-quality forage that can maintain high levels of animal production, increase enterprise flexibility and create new marketing opportunities.

The need for producers to increase productivity and reduce costs has been a driving force behind the increased use of silage.

On many farms silage-making is now a regular annual operation.

Drought and concerns about climate change are causing other producers to consider the advantages of silage for longer term storage.

Improvements in silage-making technology and the availability of efficient silage-handling machinery have encouraged the adoption of silage on many farms.

Improved silage technology

Technological advances have enabled farmers to more consistently and more easily produce high-quality silage to feed to their livestock. These include:

Advances in knowledge that have improved silage-making practises (for example, the importance of rapid wilting and ensuring an airtight seal).
Improvements in silage-making technology (for example, plastics and inoculants).
Machinery developments to improve the efficiency of silage production (for example, mowers, mower conditioners, tedders and precision chop forage harvesters).
More storage options (chopped, baled, bulk or individual sealing) that provide producers with greater flexibility of their silage system.
Improved mechanisation of silage feedout systems which can significantly reduce labour requirements and wastage.
Availability of machinery that allows silage to be fed in mixed rations.

Potential benefits of silage

The reasons a farmer makes silage will vary between farms and include personal preferences. The main reasons include:

The need to improve pasture utilisation and increase productivity per hectare.
The valuable role for silage as a pasture management tool.
Reduced reliance on irrigation water and the need to maximise production per megalitre used.
Capacity to cut earlier in the season and produce a higher quality product compared to hay production.
Ability to spread the harvesting period over a longer period than for hay.
Reduced losses of dry matter and quality during field and harvesting operations and reduced susceptibility to adverse weather compared to hay.
Market demand for consistency of supply and quality of animal product (for example, milk or meat).
Silage can be a high-quality supplement for ‘out-of-season’ production.
Ability to grow a variety of crops for silage production (for example, maize, sorghum or cereals). This diversity can increase farm productivity to levels higher than possible with pasture alone.
Suitability of silage for long-term storage of high quality feed for drought or flood reserves.
Potential to salvage high-quality forage from drought or frost-affected crops (for example, canola or winter cereals).

– From NSW DPI.

By McPherson Media Group