# wrapping dry hay?



## G&GFarms (Dec 31, 2014)

I was wondering how it works to wrap dry hay with my in-line wrapper. I was looking to see if any one had any experience doing this let me know. Thanks


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## foz682 (Jan 10, 2013)

Works great, a lot less hassle than tarping.


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## Redbaler (Jun 10, 2011)

I am interested in this too. Maybe make the first cutting bales hold up a bit better? Maybe not worth the price.


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## Tim/South (Dec 12, 2011)

There are people who wrap fresh hay and call it "sweet hay" and feed it to horses.

Some on this forum have pondered the idea of fresh cut hay needing to breath or sweat, that wrapping soon might cause mold.

Just throwing that out there. I do not wrap.


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## LaneFarms (Apr 10, 2010)

I do wrap hay and have tried wrapping dry hay and in my climate it doesn't work. I tried both white and black plastic. Both had moisture issues even when the hay had been cured in a barn. The black even melted during our hot summers.


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## TJH (Mar 23, 2014)

The U of Kentucky has a good read on wrapping hay. They say between every bale to cut the plastic for ventilation, and say you will get some mold on the outside but it is much less than leaving hay outside.


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

I've even had problems storing "dry" hay under tarps, can't see wrapping working very well unless they were stacked inside for 6-8 weeks to fully cure out before being wrapped, maybe even longer.

When I still tarped first cutting hay I'd stack however many bales I intended to cover in a separate building and let em sit as long as possible until I needed that building for hay, move all the first out and cover then start stacking later cuttings in the building I just emptied, would still get a little mold under the tarps.


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## FiveRow (Aug 13, 2010)

We wrap a lot of dry bales the same day they are baled. Our experience has been that it takes just as much wrap to keep them looking nice as a wet bale. If we put less than 6 layers of 1.5mil, we have moisture and mold issues. Running rows north/south instead of east/west so that the sun hits both sides really shows up on our dry bales. The north side of an east/west row will many times be damp/discolored/moldy.


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## Widairy (Jan 1, 2016)

I've had very mixed luck with wrapped hay in general. Usually for me the dryer the worse the mold issues. I wouldn't recommend it but your climate may be more hospitable.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

I have seen excellent and I have seen less than excellent results with dry here at the same day it was baled . If it was Hay I was going to feed a bale it and wrap it dry any day I wanted to and I think you would be fine. We have already baled it put it in the shed and right before we baled the next cutting about 30 to 40 days later pulled some out and wrapped it and that kept perfect. If it is wrapped and then sweats it'll get a lot of black chalky dusty moldy looking stuff on the outside. That stuff probably won't penetrate the bales 
But if you're looking for potential buyers that may turn them off. We also use a little preservative potassium sorbate when we're trying to wrap dry hay. It must be done properly we generally use 6 layers of coverage or 3 times around with 50/50 coverage


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