Grow More Milk with Cut to Clamp

Consistency has never mattered more than now. Increase the amount of milk you produce from your own silage and reduce your reliance on bought-in feeds with our best practice advice and 5 simple steps.

More milk from forage

The grass you grow is a major asset. Grow more milk is a new initiative from Volac aimed at helping you to ‘lock in’ as much of its nutritional value as possible when you turn it into silage. That way, more of its dry matter and nutrients are available to produce milk.

Part of the initiative (though certainly not all) centres around additive use. But we make no apologies for this. An additive is an integral part of making better silage, and there’s a huge amount of research showing how Ecosyl can help you do just that. There is also NEW proof.

But it’s not all about the additive.

For instance, there’s also NEW research showing how taking five cuts in a season, rather than three, could improve the energy content of grass enough to equate to about £333 in extra milk being produced per hectare of grass grown (about £135/acre).

Keep reading to discover how YOU could grow more milk from YOUR silage from now on …

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‘Set up’ your grass to make the best silage

Here’s an overview of what you will receive…

Step 1. Cut grass at its nutritional peak

Producing the best possible silage means ensuring that grass is cut at its nutritional peak. But it’s also important to cut grass correctly to aid its fermentation.

Want to ‘turbocharge’ your silage’s nutritional value?

Have you considered cutting grass younger – while it’s more digestible and higher in protein – and taking more cuts per season? In other words, making multi-cut silage?

Step 2. Wilting to maintain nutrient content

Take a closer look at how to wilt your grass precisely and maintain nutrient content.

Step 3. Focus on your harvesting technique

It's all about technique! Harvesting technique has a big impact on how well your silage will preserve once in the – minimise losses in both dry matter and nutritional quality.

Step 4. Don't leave your silage to chance

Use of a proven additive is an integral part of the process - helping you 'set up' your grass to make the best possible silage. We show you just what an additive can do for your silage through our the latest research in making multi-cut grass.

Step 5. Top tips for clamp consolidation

Don’t underestimate how well silage needs to be consolidated to achieve a good preservation. It is often an area that can be improved.

Latest research from Volac

With more dairy farmers now making multi-cut silage, as well as demonstrating the extra energy potential of multi-cut grass, new Volac research has also examined its preservation.

Although multi-cut offers nutritional benefits, it can be more challenging to ensile. Its higher protein can contribute to buffering of the fermentation, while shorter cutting intervals can mean less time for slurry to dissipate, and so increased risk of slurry bacteria being present, which can produce dry matter losses.

With these challenges in mind, the research examined how these might be mitigated, by comparing how the fermentation proceeded in multi-cut samples without an additive, versus where Ecosyl was used.

You can find out more about our latest research here.