New harvest 2023! What should you pay attention to when it comes to new hay? / News

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The summer is approaching, and that means new batches of hay! This is convenient because the available stock from the 2022 harvest is now limited. Due to the dry weather in March, April, and May last year, many batches contain a lot of sugar and little protein. And this is precisely the combination that no one wants. Fortunately, we manage to find suitable batches for our customers through extensive searching, and we have navigated the year with not too much 'switching' between batches.

But that was last year. In a very short time, the new harvest of 2023 will arrive. We are all looking forward to it. Many people know that new hay cannot be fed immediately, but not everyone knows the reason behind this and what to pay attention to. We are happy to share more about this in this blog.

How does fermentation occur in hay?

The new grass is tall enough again, is mowed, and dried in the field. When the grass is dry enough, it is pressed into large or small bales as hay. “Great,” you might say, “we can feed it!” But that is not the case. The grass and plants in the hay have different thicknesses and hardnesses. As a result, the hay does not dry out evenly. Many knuckles of grass stems and thicker twigs from other plants contain more moisture than other parts of the hay. When these are compressed in a bale, that moisture wants to escape. In other words, the drier parts of the hay will act like a sponge for the wetter parts. Due to this transformation, some fermentation can occur in the hay, and when an animal eats the fermenting hay, it can get colic (stomach pain) from it. We certainly want to prevent that.

What determines the drying time of new hay?

This transformation process is worse for hay that is mowed in May than in, for example, June or July. During these months, the grass and plants have stood longer and have grown more. As a result, a plant naturally loses a lot of its moisture and dies off at the stem. There are also differences between grass seed hay, straw, and meadow hay. With grass seed hay and straw, we have to consider this process for a much shorter time than with meadow hay. For meadow hay, we always recommend waiting six weeks before feeding, and for grass seed hay and straw, four weeks.

Apart from fermentation, there is another reason to wait a bit before feeding new hay. Many plants naturally contain toxins in a mild form. Think of a buttercup, for example. During this period of dying off, these toxins disappear, making the hay increasingly better for feeding.

Hopefully, after reading this blog, you understand better why you cannot feed new hay immediately and what to look out for with new hay. This way, you can confidently buy new hay because, let's be honest: nothing smells better than fresh hay in your storage. Did you know that Hay to You always mentions the mowing date and the date from which you can safely feed new hay? This way, you can order with confidence and easily calculate whether you might still need old hay as a bridge. If you would like advice, please contact us. We are ready to help you, with a little love from a hay fork!