Fortress wins All Wales Big Bale Silage competition
Gwynedd beef and sheep farmer Gwyn Parry has won the All Wales Big Bale Silage competition for 2016, with silage cut from a field growing the Fortress seed mixture from Oliver Seeds
Yr Orsedd is an organic farm at Pencaenewydd, Pwllheli, running to 243ha (600 acres) with 170ha (420 acres) owned and the rest rented, split across four holdings.
Most of the land is marginal, rising to 233m (700ft) above sea level and predominantly north facing. The soil is shallow gravel and sand and there are rushes growing on many of the fields. The farm is in the Glastir Advanced and Glastir Organic schemes.
The farm carries a herd of 70 Black Limousin suckler cows, which are mated with a stabliser bull, with male calves finished at 18 to 24 months of age off just grazed grass. Heifers are kept as replacements. There are also 420 Welsh Mountain breeding ewes and 180 ewe lambs.
The cows are cubicle housed in winter, but calve outdoors in April, after lambing. The cows are paddock grazed on a 21-day rotation and the sheep follow the cows around.
The sheep only ever eat grazed grass and the lambs are sold to Dunbia from the middle of June to October.
Gwyn and Guto Parry by this year’s round bale silage
The soil is tested every two to three years and 4ha (10 acres) to 6ha (15 acres) is reseeded every year with suitable mixtures. These include Sabre Hi Pro – a top performing silage mixture with red clover and Century a long-term grazing ley.
Mr. Parry has also done some overseeding with Javelin – a medium term ley specifically designed for beef and sheep farms and Typhoon a dedicated overseeding mix.
Award winning silage
One cut of silage is taken in early June, cut and carted by contractors. The silage ground receives one application of slurry in mid April at a rate of 22,230 litres/ha (2,000 galls/acre).
The grass is mown with a mower conditioner at midday and wilted for 24 hours before baling. Additive is applied and the bales are wrapped with six layers of plastic. One hundred and sixty one 800kg bales were made in 2015 from 12ha (30 acres).
Fortress is a long-term cutting and grazing mixture with a range of intermediate and late perennial ryegrasses, with small amounts of meadow fescue, timothy and white clover. It combines yield and quality with hardiness and produces a dense sward.
| Winning Bale Analysis | |
| D-value | 75.1 |
| ME (MJ) | 12.0 |
| Crude protein (%) | 9.4 |
| pH | 4.3 |
Competition judge, Dave Davies of Silage Solutions, said that Gwyn had won because he clearly paid very close attention to detail, maximising his production from a simple grass baled-silage system, which was keeping bought-in feed costs to a minimum.
The Parry family is now hosting a demonstration farm for Farming Connect and will be looking to improve grass utilisation further. Another objective is to maintain farm profitability whilst reducing reliance on subsidies. They will be running trials on the use of legumes and exploring various homegrown protein options.