Turning kikuyu pastures into top quality silage is no mean feat but in March this year at Tocal College’s dairy near Paterson, 10 hectares of kikuyu were transformed into high-quality, award-winning silage.
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A sample was taken from the 70 bales of kikuyu and the results surprised many.
The silage came back with energy and protein levels to match the best ryegrass silage.
The bales went on to win the Summer/Tropical Pasture section in the annual NSW Grasslands Society Hay and Silage Feed Quality Awards.
These awards have been running since 2009.
Silage samples were taken from the Tocal dairy’s silage as part of the PROfarm top fodder course to show the participants the value of using feed quality tests in both making and feeding out silage.
The samples were tested at the Department of Primary Industries (DPI) Feed Quality Lab at Wagga Wagga and then entered in the silage competition.
DPI technical specialist Neil Griffiths said the tropical pasture prize is not always awarded, as it is difficult to meet high quality standards with tropical grasses.
But this sample was an excellent silage with good metabolisable energy of 10.2 MJ/kg DM and crude protein of 20.3 per cent.
Mr Griffiths said that was up there with ryegrass silage.
Tocal dairy milks 220 predominately Holstein cows (rolling herd average 8000L) run on 80ha farm grazing annual ryegrass and clover with kikuyu summer pastures.
The farm produces 600t o 800 round bales of silage each year to fill in feed gaps in winter and to feed out to the dry cattle and replacement heifers.
Dairy manager Matt Hogan (pictured) said the 2013 spring was reasonably tight at Tocal and they were a little light on for quality ryegrass silage for the following winter.
“This led to the decision to make this kikuyu silage, with the focus on quality, to bulk up the number of milker-quality silage bales for the following winter feed gap,” he said.
“The 70 bales were produced off 10ha in mid March and ryegrass was sown into the paddocks shortly after.
“It is very pleasing to see such good figures on these bales and it will give us more flexibility in our fodder conservation practices in the future.”
Mr Hogan said it was important to prepare the kikuyu paddock properly before making the silage to ensure the end product was a quality feed source.
“It costs as much to make mulch as it does to make quality silage,” he said.
In the case of the Tocal paddock the kikuyu was knocked down hard and then allowed to grow back to a four leaf stage.
It was all growthy leaf, no matted material.
The kikuyu was baled using a New Holland rotor cut baler to achieve maximum density.
“If you can get top quality silage it’s as good to feed to the milkers as grain, but it’s all about quality,” Mr Hogan said.
