Silage Making in India - Definitive Introduction 3 Types of Silo
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November 25, 2018

Silage Making in India

Silage Making in India has been recommended and taught for number of years now.

While the adaptation was low at the start, slowly, Silage Making is picking up pace and gaining popularity among Dairy Farmers of India.  Especially among Dairy Farmers of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh,  the interest in Silage Making in India is on the rise with modern dairy farming management techniques being adopted more and more.

In Dairy farming business, essential element steady production of milk is to provide cows consistently with healthy diet which includes major portion as Green Fodder, throughout the year.

In recent past, there has been continuous shortage of water due to uncertainty in rains in many parts of India.

To beat famines and droughts,  government has tried establishing fodder banks time and again but they did not do well  and farmers have faced losses every year.

Silage helps in overcoming the limitations by offering opportunity to have availability of nutritious green fodder throughout the year.

Thus, it makes preparation of silage an important activity in Dairy farming by managing the stable fodder supply around the year and ensuring consistent milk production.

 

Silage Making in India Easy-pit-silage

Silage making in India Pit Silage In

 

Preparation of Silage

Dairy farmers in India carrying out milk business, may not be able to make green fodder available throughout the year.   They should take advantage of the favorable condition during first harvest after monsoon rains.

During and after Monsoon rains, green fodder is in abundant availability at low rates.  We recommend storing it as silage for rest of the year to cut costs.

In previous post, we learnt about Loose Housing Dairy farm.  If we combine this benefits of silage with Loose housing farm, the synergy can really take us far in our endeavor of Milk business.

Dairy farm can grow really fast with proper Fodder Management which involves use of Silage extensively.

What is Silage

Bag Silage India

Maize Silage in India

 

Silage is green fodder stored and preserved for yearlong or more, with majority of its nutrient values intact, just like mango pickle.

To prepare silage we need to store the green fodder for 45 days in airtight way, thus its nutritious state is maintained without any loss of vital nutrients.

It is the same Principle that which is used for making pickles since ages.

 

Which crops should be used while making silage?

You can use Corn or Maize (most used), Jawar, Bajra and few grassy plants while making silage.

Corn or Maize silage is considered desirable and recommended more often.    Dairy farmers generally use fresh sticky or flowered Maize or jowar to make silage.  Cereal plants should be in their soft-dough stage.  Plants like lucern are also used while making silage.  The dry matter in the plant at the time of harvest should be at 35-40% for Silage Making

Advantages of silage

  1. Green fodder supply can be assured for whole year in rainy season itself
  2. With silage, we can make green fodder available in summers also
  3. We can save time, energy and efforts which are required to cut green fodder, transport, and fed to cows everyday
  4. With consistency in the quality of fodder the animals will fall sick less number of times. As traditionally we are used to provide green fodder in rainy season and dry fodder in summer, Animals often fall sick because of the inconsistent quality of the food.
Silage-making-india-tractor-bunker

Preparation of Silage

  1. With help of silage, farmers with very small area of land can also handle large number of animals with without worrying about the size of land or amount of green fodder required.
  2. Even if you don’t have your own farm, you can buy green fodder during rainy season at cheap costs and store it as silage. It will help you to cut down on overall expenditure.
  3. Silage improves the quality of green fodder and reduces the amount of external supplement
  4. Animals love silage. It reduces the amount of wastage in fodder.
  5. There is no adverse effect of drought
  6. The corn or Maize crop required for silage become ready for harvest in 75 to 80 days.   In contrast to daily cutting of crop for fodder, in Silage making, As whole harvest is taken off at once, the land can again be used for another crop.

 

Why Indian Dairy Farmers avoid preparing silage ?

  1. Fear of wastage of good quality fodder
  2. Horrible Experiences of silage making and fodder wastage when experimenting with it in first attempt
  3. Misconceptions like silage can be used only for big dairy farms
  4. Silage preparation is very expensive
  5. Lack of information about why and how to make silage

 

Types of Silage 

  1.  Bag Silage
bag-murghas-powergotha

Powergotha-bag-silage

  1. Pit Silage
    Pit-silage-powergotha

    Pit Silage making in India

  2. Bunker Silage
    bunker-silage-powergotha

    Bunker Silage Making in India

Procedure to make silage

Corn and jowar are ready to cut after 75- 80 days after their plantation.  When these plants are on the stage of flowering you should harvest them.  The dry matter is at 35-40%

While preparing silage the water content in the plant should be 60-65%.  If the water content is higher than this you should dry the crop for some time in sunlight to dry after the harvest.

After this, one has to cut harvest into small pieces of approximately 2 inches with the help of chaff cutter machine.  Once the crop is cut with chaff cutter it should be immediately stored in a bag or in a pit or in the silage bunker.   The cut pieces should directly fall into bag, pit, or bunker.

Spread the chopped corn evenly in the bag, pit or bunker.   Then you need press the crop to remove air for airtight closing.  The air removal can be carried out manually by humans or pressing by tractor.

Powergotha-bunker-silage-making

silage-preparation-india-bunker

 

The chopped fodder is stored in multiple layers one above other. Each layer is pressed evenly so that no air remains inside.  The layer thickness should be just enough so as to be able to press it easily by walking or tractor and remove all air.

After all layers are complete, close the pit, or bunker with a plastic cover over it and make it airtight

On this plastic cover, place 6 to 8 inches of layer of soil to make the cover steady.   Make sure that the place is free of water logging and that no rain water goes in through slippage or any other way.

In 1 cubic feet of space 15 to 16 kg of silage can be stored.   One can plan the area as per requirement.

While storing silage, after each layer, generally a spray 0f culture of useful bacteria or salt solution is used.  This helps the fodder leaves to stay green and free of fungus.

Many a times, the above mentioned precautions aren’t taken while preparing silage.  Missing a single step can also lead to failure in making quality silage.

When you are doing it – preparing silage for the first time, Powergotha recommends that you don’t add any additional ingredient.   Prepare silage for learning from experience.

If possible, you can use powdered form of silage culture.   It will reduce the possibility of spoilage.  Powergotha recommends usage of powdered culture or zero additives to succeed in first effort of silage making.

Bag-silage-powergotha

Bag-silage-maharashtra-India

There’s some residual oxygen in the enclosure.  However, after closing the silage pit or bunker for air tight enclosure, rest of the oxygen is consumed by the green fodder.   No fungus is can grow inside it as it is airtight.   Because of secretion of lactic acid, useful microorganisms grow.

Storing green fodder in airtight space as Silage for year round use, has multiple benefits for dairy farming.

Quash all doubts, try silage making and excel in your dairy farming business.

Dr. Shailesh Madane

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You might also like :  Process of Silage Making Explained – Step By Step 

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Ref: Here’s a good guide for Silage Making in India by NDDB.

12 Comments on “Silage Making in India

Vasu A.M.
May 18, 2021 at 10:58 am

Vasu A. M.

For a learner like me, they have explained the whole process of silage making in a very simplistic manner. Thanks very much

Reply
Prabhakar Reddy
November 29, 2020 at 2:39 am

Sir,
This article is very good information for small Dairy formers.

Reply
Chegondi naveen Satish Kumar
October 28, 2020 at 4:51 am

Iam intrastate but its heavy machinery process

Reply
Ashok Wadhawan
October 24, 2020 at 11:51 pm

Congratulation on writing an excellent article which is simple to understand every aspect of silage making,consumption and highlighted bebefits.
We can support in production of formulated silage mixed total ration in small easy to serve and carry 30Kg packings

Reply
K so Phani kumar
August 28, 2020 at 12:37 am

Can we make silage from super nepier grass

Reply
Madhukar Bajirao Bondar
August 26, 2020 at 8:09 am

Is it any possibility to export silege in huge contity.

Reply

[…] Article 1- Silage Production 1 […]

Reply
Ankur
March 6, 2020 at 12:21 pm

Very interesting article on Silage. Silage actually is the need of hour, with high green fodder deficit & poor nutrition to animals, which further results in poor quantity & quality of milk.
Advance technologies are also available in India like Compacted Bales.

https://www.segelindia.com/company.html?Dairy%20&%20Agriculture&&ORKEL

Govt Departments, Entrepreneurs, Dairy cooperatives, commercial dairies should take a lead in supporting the small dairy farmer.

Reply
Gurav Nilesh B
March 6, 2020 at 11:25 am

sir i do make murgrass your refrance

Reply

[…] Silage Making in India […]

Reply
Mahavir nikate
March 28, 2019 at 3:08 am

I want process and machinery to make silage

Reply
Ajeeshkumar RV
June 27, 2020 at 1:21 pm

Hi,

There is any hope for silage business. Planning to start a silage business.
Need your help…

Thanks in Advance

Reply

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