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Little River, TX | Just as those who are knowledgeable on the way to successfully bale hay in the Humid East, can put out wrong information for hay growers in the Arid West. The opposite is also true.
Just as there are parts of this Great Land that seldom has a relative humidity much above 50% there are other parts of this Great Land where the humidity never goes below 50%.
jfgc your system is perfect, for ColoradoCattleman's question. It might just confuse a hay grower in the UP of Michigan.
I suspect the reason why there are so many snow balls in Lausanne is because they can not cure, bale, and store Ryegrass, during their spring.
What a moisture tester will not tell is what the stem moisture is. That is where we can find problems. It is dangerous to bale hay as the hay is curing down to the magic moisture level. With a surface dew it is possible to bale above the recommended moisture levels with no problem. After all the researchers like to use that patented moisture tester that weighs a sample and then heats it to drive off all the moisture. What is lost is the moisture from the leaves and stems combined. That little gadget will look at 5% leaf moisture and 27% stem moisture and declare it is 16% moisture, good to bale. Result is all the leaves are on the ground, and at best we end up half the number of bales and those are a bundle of moldy sticks.
Reverse that with stems at 10% moisture and leaves at 22% moisture, the patented moisture tester again reports 16% moisture, the electronic moisture tester sees 22% moisture. The result is a field full of leafy hay that is worth something.
I do not have the know how nor the nerve to bale on stem moisture.
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Round bale moisture ?????
