# Hay volume question



## Marshall

I have 30 acres of bermuda grass. I cut the first cutting off of it and rolled it in round bales that were net wrapped with the 51" wrap at 66" high. The moisture in the hay was 11%. Off of this 30 acres, I rolled 107 rolls of hay.

My question is this, how may square bales would this come out to if I were to keep the square bales at 50lbs. I dont actually know what the rould bales weigh, if I did, or had a pretty good number, the math would be easy. My father told me today that to figure each round bale at 1200 lbs.

Is this pretty accurate?

Thanks for the replies.

Marshall


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## stevemsinger

Marshall, a lot is going to depend on the baler. Is it a solid core or a soft core? How tight are you rolling your hay. I see some solid core balers that are so tight that you can't hardly push your fingers in and some that are so loose that you can sticky your whole hand in. If your bales are all consistant, and you really want to know you should just load one on a truck and go weigh it at the feed mill. Take the bale off and weigh the truck empty. You will have a good starting point to know your average. Most feed mills around here will do that for free and will even off load and load the bale for you while you are there. They want your business and will do little things like that to help.


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## mlappin

Exactly^. Once you know the weight of the rounds, simply divide the weight of your small squares into that. I figure on mine I get any where from 18-24 small squares a round.


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## okbuckaroo

4X5 JD round bale a good rule of thumb = 12-14 square bales


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## Production Acres

Weigh the bales - 4x5 bales have come in here weighing from 450# to 1150# and yes both were dry hay. Depends on the windrow, the type of hay, the tension on the baler, and yes the moisture. There is no substite for an unbiased set of scales!


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## Randy Litton

Volume metrically a 60" X 48" diameter roll works out to 11.97 square bales 36x14x18".

Take this with a grain of salt; We have unrolled hay an re baled squares and barely got 10 bales because the dry grass compacted more with broken stems.


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## skyrydr2

Spot on Littleton farms! 4x5 bales average 8-10 bales depending on density of the bale.
I have re-baled hundreds of 4x5s and 5x5s and none were more than 800lbs with quality hay in them. The heavy ones usually were molded inside, ok for cows not horses,(well horsey people horses lol) 
I would safely bank on 10 bales per roll.


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## IH 1586

skyrydr2 said:


> Spot on Littleton farms! 4x5 bales average 8-10 bales depending on density of the bale.
> I have re-baled hundreds of 4x5s and 5x5s and none were more than 800lbs with quality hay in them. The heavy ones usually were molded inside, ok for cows not horses,(well horsey people horses lol)
> I would safely bank on 10 bales per roll.


Those numbers don't seem to add up. We rebaled 4x4 and averaged 13 bales and I figure about 21 out of a 4x5. My 4x4 weighed about 540 lbs. and at 40 lbs. for small square that comes out to 13.5 bales and a 4x5 at 840 lbs would yield about 21 bales.

Your saying your 4x5's only weigh about 400 lbs unless your making 100 lb small squares.


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## Randy Litton

My discussion was about volume. Weight is dependent on grass species, moisture content at baling, moisture content when re baled, and the size of the bale . When the 10 Bales were re balled from a 4 X 5 roll, the bales were 36 x 18 x 14" and weighed an average of 60 lbs a standard small sq is 36x18x14 @ 50#. A 4X5 Roll at 20% moisture weighing 900# will lose 78# if stored in dry barn and have a 11% moisture by volume after 1 year depending on ambient storage conditions.

We do not bale sq bales above 16% because of possible spontaneous combustion when stored. As the baling day progresses, the % moisture can drop, requiring additional bale density adjustments to maintain weight.

I am not trying to say the math always works out to represent actual results.

I am saying I use math to help manage baling operations.

We use a Bale Bandit now because of lack of willing labor and needing the volume of hay necessary to make the operation profitable. Bales are 38X18X14 @ 65-70#.


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## skyrydr2

I never made a round bale, but have rebaled them. Never rebaled a freshly made one, they were all stored bales that were delivered.
I wished I had a scale large enough to have weighed them.. but never got the numbers that were said they would make. And these were hard cored bales because i had to fluff up the stuff or the baler would eat too much and you know what happens then...
I like to make a good solid bale 45-50 lbs. And it makes a mess with all the dust and leaf crumble. I avoid it if at all possible.


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