PHOTO - big silage rake

Hi Gang;
One of the local contractors rowing up silage infront of the baler. NH tractor & Claas rake.
David

In lots of areas, including ours near Maine, sileage can be pit or bunkered silage or balage silage.

Balage silage can be individually wrapped or tube wrapped.

I think if you looked at the numbers over the long haul that included the cost of the towers or bunkers, and compared it to round bales silage, then it would probably about be a wash. You don't have much up front expense with the bales, and you can also make hay with the baler. Silage wasnt a big tractor, chopper, truck and high dump, and bunkers that all cost money.
The baler will clean a field fast with a medium sized tractor. Probably less fuel goes into the bales... but more plastic which will end up offsetting the cost of the bunker over the long haul. We did bales for a number of years and switched to chop.... but that was for a more consistent feed quality, and we were also growing mroe corn anyway so we needed the chopper.... and the truck is needed for other things.
Definitely agree on the twin screw truck though. Wouldn't be without it, or the big bore N14 in front of it.

Rod

For those of you not around Greeley Colorado, imagine silage pits 100 yards wide (maybe more) and 1/4 mile or more long, piling 100-150 feet deep, and filling more than one within about 10-15 days when the corn is ready to chop...Choppers running 12 row corn heads, overload permits on all trucks...it's a sight to see...

I imagine balage must be for dairy cows, need higher quality, typically done as pit haylage around here. Silage is cheap (relatively) cow feed, haylage is a higher quality dairy feed.