[Animals 102] How To Produce Silage

Welcome to your next lesson in the Farming Simulator Academy! Today we focus on silage. We will show you how to produce silage, what ingredients and equipment you need. Let's go!

What Is Silage?

Silage is a valuable feed that is preserved by fermentation. It cannot directly be grown on fields, but can be made with grass or chaff. You obtain chaff by not harvesting some of your crops with a harvester as usual, but with a forage harvester (further explanations follow). It is part of the total mixed ration that you use to feed your cows.

Tip! You quadruple the sales value of grass and corn, just by turning it into silage and selling it at the biogas plant or animal dealer. So, financially, it's worth the effort.

How Is Silage Made?

Basically, there are three ways to produce silage:

• Option 1: Mowing grass, pressing it into bales and letting it ferment.
• Option 2: Mowing grass, collecting it with a forage wagon and fermenting it in a bunker silo.
• Option 3: Harvesting grass or chaff from above-mentioned crops with a forage harvester and fermenting it in a bunker silo.

What You Need For Producing Silage Using Grass Bales (Option 1)

• Tractor with a front loader: For operating tools and transporting resources.
• Bale handler: For transporting wrapped bales.
• Mower: For cutting the grass.
• Windrower: To arrange grass in lanes.
• Baler: To press the lanes of grass into bales.
• Bale wrapper: To turn a grass bale into silage by wrapping it. Can be included in the baler depending on the machine.

To produce silage bales, you require a meadow. Cut the grass, press it into bales and wrap them up. And after a short fermentation process (that means just waiting), you get a bale of silage. With grass, it does not matter whether it is freshly mown grass, dried grass or chaff.

Tip! If you want to get familiar with the production of silage and the usage of the needed machinery, just look up some contracts in the menu. Here you will always find some jobs for baling silage bales.

What You Need For Producing Silage Using A Forage Harvester (Option 3)

• Tractor with a front loader: For operating tools.
• Heavy tractor: Can be the same as the first tractor, if you own one that can handle both tasks. It is used to compress the silage. Wheel weights can help with this.
• Forage harvester with a fitting header: Turns your crops into chaff.
• Silage additive: Increases the yield when put into the harvester.
• Bunker silo: For fermenting chaff and grass into silage.
• Trailer: For transporting grass or silage.
• Leveler: To distribute the material evenly when driving over it.
• Fork with grapple: To get the silage out of the silo

Tip! You can also collect mowed grass with a forage wagon to deliver it to the silo instead of using a forage harvester. That would be option 2.

Let's Get To Work! (Option 3)

Step 1: Harvesting grass or chaff with a forage harvester

You get chaff by harvesting the above-listed crops with a forage harvester. But, there is one important thing to keep in mind: you need to harvest crops BEFORE they reach their final growth stage! Looking at corn, for example, you harvest it while the cobs are still green. 

Even grass can be harvested with a forage harvester. But grass should reach the final growth stage – it just gives you more material you can turn into silage.

Tip: Forage harvesters have a relatively small tank, so you should also use either an auger wagon or a trailer.

Step 2: Unloading grass or chaff into the bunker silo

In the silo, you unload your harvested chaff or grass (It does not matter whether it is freshly mown grass, dried grass or chaff).

Tip! When spreading the material, be careful not to unload too close to the rim of the silo. Otherwise, the material could be squeezed out of the silo during the compaction and will not be processed into silage.

Step 3: Compressing the material in the bunker

After you have unloaded and spread the material in your silo, you have to compress it. To do this, use your heaviest tractor. Attach a leveler, so the material is evenly spread in the silo when driving over it.

Now, just drive over the material. Try to spread it evenly by driving over heaps. Continue to compress it until 100 % "compaction" is reached – displayed in the info box when inside the bunker silo.

Tip! To gain more weight and compress more efficiently, attach a silage compressor (or another kind of weight) or use wheel weights.

Step 4: Covering the compressed material

Compacted everything? Now you have to cover the pressed material, and then it's time to wait. You can see how long the fermentation process of the silage will take in the upper left corner of the screen when standing next to the silo.

Step 5: Obtain silage from the bunker silo

To get the silage out of the bunker silo, you have to open the silo. Then you need a fork with grapple or a silage cutter. Use it to open the rest of the silo step by step. Load the silage into a trailer. Use it either to produce TMR or sell it at the biogas plant or the animal dealer.

Well Done!

Congratulations, you have successfully finished another lesson! Keep at it, and you'll be a top-notch virtual farmer in no time with Farming Simulator Academy!