Buying or Selling Wet Forages

Adapted by Gerald Higginbotham, UCCE Fresno/Madera Counties

If you are currently purchasing corn silage for your dairy, you should consider buying (or selling) forages on the basis of their moisture or dry matter (DM) content.  Typically, 30% DM is used for corn and cereal silage and 35% DM is used for alfalfa silage.  These figures are used as standard because they represent the optimum dry matter content for making quality silage.  As an example, let us say you agree to pay $40/ton for corn silage on a 30% DM basis.

Case 1:  The corn silage field actually averaged 27% DM.  Then you would pay: 27/30 x 40/ton = .9 x 40 = $36.00/ton. You pay less per ton because you are getting less dry matter per ton than you would have at 30% DM.

Case 2:  The corn silage field averaged 33% DM.  Then you would pay: 33/30 x 40/ton = 1.1 x $40/ton = $44.00/ton. This time you pay a bit more per ton because you are getting more dry matter per ton than you would at 30% DM. 

Buying forages based on the actual dry matter content can alleviate any disagreements that may come about due to forages being too wet or too dry.