# What do y'all think about this bale wrapper?



## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

I was searching Tractorhouse for used Wrappers and found this one for around $5000 new, one place has them for $4900 and another for $5100. Probably not for someone that might bale 1000's of bales a year but it looks to work pretty well. The 4' x 4' limit would work fine for here. Couldn't find a company website. They make trailed wrappers with lifts but the price more than doubles.

Diamond Z560 Wrapper


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## Bob M (Feb 11, 2012)

Looks pretty simple and not much to break. And if it does break should be easy to fix. I like it


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## Tim/South (Dec 12, 2011)

Bob M said:


> Looks pretty simple and not much to break. And if it does break should be easy to fix. I like it


I was thinking the same thing. Not as many bells and whistles to learn (or break).


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

very simple, but like pointed out I wouldn't want to do a lot of bales with it, looks to be pretty slow, with the tubeline we use a cow really has to hustle or it will be sitting waiting on the next bale.


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## C & C Cattle and Hay (Sep 6, 2011)

I was thinkn about purchasing a wrapper. Do you have to wrap them that much? How much is the wrap per roll? How many bales can you do per roll?


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

30" Bale wrap at Agrisupply is 5000' long and cost $108.

This site I found said you could get 20-22 bales wrapped with one roll of 30" wrap.

http://www.agnation.com/Bale%20Wrap.htm

If that's right it's going to cost about $5/bale to wrap them plus fuel for equipment. I'd like to hear from some real life experiences on just how many bales you can get out of a roll of wrap. With this wrapper I'd make sure I was in the area where I was going to store them so you wouldn't have to do so much moving of the bales. Possibly just have someone roll them next to each other. As tight as they appear they should roll pretty easily.


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## Tim/South (Dec 12, 2011)

I have a question on haylage in general.

Grateful, C and C and I all feed cattle. From my understanding a 4x5 roll of haylege weighs about a ton. It keeps the same weight once it has gone through the curing process.

So...if a 4x4 weighed 1200 lbs (or more) would that roll be of more feed value than a regular 4x5 roll of hay?

The only people I have talked to about haylage/silage praise the benefits, say it is worth the cost and effort. Sadly those people always seem to say what they are doing is best for everyone. I talked to one man this week who said it was not worth the effort for him and he went back to hay. His point was that he was mostly a one man operation and wrapping took an extra person and more time.

Does a 2,000 lb. roll of haylege produce twice as much feed value as a 1,000 lb roll of hay? Same grass just processed differently?


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## LaneFarms (Apr 10, 2010)

Grateful you can get plastic considerably cheaper than that. On my Tubeline I am getting close to 70 rolls on 2 rolls of plastic with a 54" roll.


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

My wife and I attended a Hay Day this past spring at a NC Ag Research Station and a Professor/Farmer from NC State gave a lecture on forage and had samples of 4 or 5 different types of forage hay that was baled at the research station. They had a wrapped bale of alfalfa hay, wrapped at 50-55% moisture. It had twice as much crude protein as any other hay there. He said you could feed that alfalfa to cattle and not have to provide any other additional protein supplement. I had a printout of the test results but may not be able to find it now, if do I'll scan it and post it.

Sorry I can't be of much more help other than that.


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

LaneFarms said:


> Grateful you can get plastic considerably cheaper than that. On my Tubeline I am getting close to 70 rolls on 2 rolls of plastic with a 54" roll.


I was hoping that you could. It just happen to be the first online price I came across.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

Tim/South said:


> I have a question on haylage in general.
> 
> Grateful, C and C and I all feed cattle. From my understanding a 4x5 roll of haylege weighs about a ton. It keeps the same weight once it has gone through the curing process.
> 
> ...


For us wrapping helps when the weather turns bad . Also getting the 1st cutting off in a timely manor. But then again we have cattle to feed selling wrapped hay can be triciky


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

Once the wrap is off the bale my wife wants to know if a haylage bale can be unrolled the way she does now. She still feeds in the old dairy troughs by rolling the bales off, so much in one section and so on, and the cows eat through stanchions. She doesn't bale any short crop hay and the bales never fall apart like Fescue hay does.


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## hog987 (Apr 5, 2011)

I have been thinking of getting a bale wrapper for awhile. Would help me get my first cut off sooner to get more second cut. The wrapped bales might be harder to sell(but I have seen 2 adds last week for people wanting them) but I could always feed them to my cattle. The price on this one is not too bad. The cheapest one I could get around here was an anderson and they started at about $12000 and were not much more than this model. It would still allow me to work when I dont have a long enough window to get the hay dry between storms.


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

Here's some info I found on Baleage, Haylage what you want to call it:

http://www.uky.edu/Ag/Forage/Baleage%20FAQ%20-Hancock%20Sears%20Smith%20SENA%20Review.pdf

http://ohioline.osu.edu/agf-fact/0010.html


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## Bob M (Feb 11, 2012)

Not sure you are going to get twice the protein out of wrapped hay. But making young hay is usually harder to dry than mature hay, wrapping would allow young hay to be baled with less chance of problems. It is easier to keep the leaves on alfalfa with wrapped hay, still not sure you will double your protein unless you don't know how to bale alfalfa and knock every leaf off.


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## JD3430 (Jan 1, 2012)

I have always thought this would take the stress out of making hay. You cut, rake bale in same day? Sounds too good to be true.
If a commercial hay contractor like me were to do this, I guess it wouldn't work since bales are sealed and likely to puncture or tear with handling and transport??????


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## enos (Dec 6, 2009)

15 years of wrapping bales. A few things. 
About 22-25 4'x5' bales outa a 30" roll of plastic.
Good, tight hard core bales work best
Mow one day, bale next. Leave mower wings set in narrow. Just bale swath up. 
Go slow with baler and get air out. Just like packing a pit silo, air is a silage spoiler
Need to use hugger to handle bales
Gives a operator more options for harvest as long as there is cows around to eat it.
Expensive to put up per tonne. Chopped silage half the price.
I figure with plastic, handling baling etc they cost me about $40 a peice. Same volume of chopped silage is $20
I use wrapper as a option, not a main harvesting tool.
If weather changes you can bale and wrap to save a crop, dry hay pays better
If we are having a wet year I will take off first as silage and then take a second, dry year just one cut of hay.
Disposal of plastic is getting harder...recyle outfits want it washed...that is a $hit job.
I try and make dry hay as much as possible but with a wrapper you can cut on calender a bit more and not by weather as much


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## 8350HiTech (Jul 26, 2013)

Grateful11 said:


> Once the wrap is off the bale my wife wants to know if a haylage bale can be unrolled the way she does now. She still feeds in the old dairy troughs by rolling the bales off, so much in one section and so on, and the cows eat through stanchions. She doesn't bale any short crop hay and the bales never fall apart like Fescue hay does.


Yes, it can be. Assuming she doesn't mind stinking like haylage. (And you don't mind  )


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## JD3430 (Jan 1, 2012)

So what does a wrapped silage bale sell for compared to a dry, quality hay bale? 
If I get $70 for a 4x5 of horse hay, what would I get for same bale "green" and wrapped in plastic? 
Seems like a n option only for the dairyman.


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## 8350HiTech (Jul 26, 2013)

JD3430 said:


> So what does a wrapped silage bale sell for compared to a dry, quality hay bale?
> If I get $70 for a 4x5 of horse hay, what would I get for same bale "green" and wrapped in plastic?
> Seems like a n option only for the dairyman.


I've seen nice wrapped alfalfa sell at the auction (Shippensburg) for $100+/T but that is always a crapshoot. It sounds good because you're selling a bunch of water. But baleage at auction isn't the best way to go. If you're going to sell baleage I'd think you want a consistent, private market. It will be worth more to the buyer if they know you have 100 bales to sell and they can plan accordingly instead of discovering you only had a few and now they have to find another source ASAP so they don't yank their cows digestion back and forth. I had neighbors that shipped wrapped bales all the way to ny last winter but your most profitable way to sell baleage would probably be to find a local buyer who could get them in relatively small increments. That would save on trucking a bunch of water around and likely allow you to tube wrap them which would be much cheaper per bale.


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## 8350HiTech (Jul 26, 2013)

... and wrapped grass barely brings any premium at all. But you can't compare the price to your horse hay. You have to compare the baleage price to your hay that gets rained on because you didn't get it dry before rain came. It might let you gross the same money, but obviously with less net than dry. But more net than mulch.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

Agree wrapped alfalfa can in some cases can be very profitable . In our area there is not a stable market for grass hay wrapped


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## Tim/South (Dec 12, 2011)

JD3430 said:


> I have always thought this would take the stress out of making hay. You cut, rake bale in same day? Sounds too good to be true.
> If a commercial hay contractor like me were to do this, I guess it wouldn't work since bales are sealed and likely to puncture or tear with handling and transport??????


The transport is pretty much a deal breaker for me. All of my hay is baled away from our farm. I would haul the rolls here to be wrapped. That would be easier than having to transport wrapped rolls home, and having to take an extra tractor and equipment to the field.

It would not take many 60% rolls to max out a trailer so that means more trips to haul the rolls to their wrapping or feeding destination.

In the first link that Grateful posted above, it hints that it may take more haylage rolls than hay rolls to feed the same number of cattle. That refutes what a person told me about double feed value in haylage (which sounded too good to be true).


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

JD3430 said:


> So what does a wrapped silage bale sell for compared to a dry, quality hay bale?
> If I get $70 for a 4x5 of horse hay, what would I get for same bale "green" and wrapped in plastic?
> Seems like a n option only for the dairyman.


You would not wrap all your hay . But what do you get for your hay when it is laying 2 weeks rained on 3 times


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

Some more good photos and tips at the bottom of the page on making Balage:

http://www.eyemead.com/x063.htm

Nice looking equipment to boot ;-)


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## Bonfire (Oct 21, 2012)

Grateful11 said:


> My wife and I attended a Hay Day this past spring at a NC Ag Research Station and a Professor/Farmer from NC State gave a lecture on forage and had samples of 4 or 5 different types of forage hay that was baled at the research station. They had a wrapped bale of alfalfa hay, wrapped at 50-55% moisture. It had twice as much crude protein as any other hay there. He said you could feed that alfalfa to cattle and not have to provide any other additional protein supplement. I had a printout of the test results but may not be able to find it now, if do I'll scan it and post it.
> 
> Sorry I can't be of much more help other than that.


Here are some analysis' of some BMR Sudex and Bermuda grass haylage over the last couple of years. These were very drought stressed and harvested a little late. The Sudex was probably 50% headed out. Especially the GB Farm. The home place had some irrigation.

I don't know how the comparison would be of these species of dry hay.

All hay was fed as it pertains to the nitrate ion. The really high crop I did not sell and fed here over the Winter.

As to the wrapper. I have an inline Anderson. Two 30" rolls of film will wrap ~90 bales 50" tall. I run about 8-900 psi on the hydraulic system (braking) when the machine is going through a cycle. This helps smash the bales together going inline in order to get the air out just as its being wrapped.

My wife hauls wet hay from the field to the wrapper. She strategically places the bales at a 45 degree angle (the best she can) next to the line to be made. When I'm through baling, I start wrapping. I want everything close at hand. I push a one minute wrap cycle per bale (as best I can). I like to be hovering over the wrapper table with the FEL as the carriage is coming back. It's usually late at night at this point and I don't want to be driving 2-300 feet each way to get a bale. If you just rolled 90 bales, that's an hour and a half of just wrapping with no other inefficiencies (replacing a roll of film, restart film if it breaks, run out of gas (my fault)).

I invested in a wrapper because it takes the weather out of the equation, for the most part (muddy fields). I don't chase forecasts anymore. I baled in the sprinkling rain one time so I could get finished up. Then wrapped in the rain (not fun).

Besides, the cows eat it to the ground. Much less waste for me.


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## hog987 (Apr 5, 2011)

So here is my thinking. Right now Iam cutting hay at 5 ton per acre. But it is mature and being cut late, so I will only get one cutting. This year anyways when I can cut a bit earlier I was getting 4 ton per acre and the second cut is looking like it will be at least 3 ton per acre. Just not very much second cut. So that is 7 ton per acre instead of 5. Prices around here I might get $40 a bale for first cut and say at least $50 for second cut. Assume 1000 pound bales.

first cut at 5 ton per acre. gross $400

If I had a wrapper and could keep working when I cant get dry hay.(for easy math just using dry hay figures)

First cut 4 ton per acre gross $320

second cut 3 ton per acre gross $300

Total $620 minus plastic.

Difference of $220 per acre. and if it allowed me to get at least another 80 acres of second cut. That $17600.

I guess I better start looking into a wrapper soon


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## JD3430 (Jan 1, 2012)

What about the price of the wrapper itself? On top of the cost of plastic, doesnt that cut down on gross profit, too?


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## Fowllife (Sep 10, 2010)

Tim/South said:


> In the first link that Grateful posted above, it hints that it may take more haylage rolls than hay rolls to feed the same number of cattle. That refutes what a person told me about double feed value in haylage (which sounded too good to be true).


The part you really need to take into consideration is actual dry matter. If you are used to making a 5x6 roll of dry hay then you would be feeding a lot more 4x5 haylage bales. If you back out the moisture and comparer the bales on a dry matter basis you can compare the quanities needed.

Most baleage is made in 4x4 or 4x5 bales. Weight & wrapper capacity becomes an issue with anything larger.


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## Fowllife (Sep 10, 2010)

JD3430 said:


> So what does a wrapped silage bale sell for compared to a dry, quality hay bale?
> If I get $70 for a 4x5 of horse hay, what would I get for same bale "green" and wrapped in plastic?
> Seems like a n option only for the dairyman.


I agree with the other Endrow, you shouldn't be comparing prices for good hay, but your mustroom hay instead.

The wrapper Bonfine has is a tube line wrapper which is much farter then individual wrapped bales. There may be someone in your area that does this custom, or that rents out a wrapper. If you can find one then you can market to livestock & dairy guys. Haul the bales to there farm & wrap them there.

Grateful - For you I would think that a sigle wrapper may be a good option. As Endrow said though, you will not wrap all your hay, just what you need to to save. With the summer you have had I would give it a try. If you wrap then and let them sit where they are then you can just spear them when you go to feed them out. You would not need a sqeeze unless you planned on moving or stacking them.


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## hay king (Feb 6, 2011)

wrapped baleage where to start well i do about 1000 -1500 bales wrapped a year.

how many bales per 30" roll ?

That depends on what you have your prestrech set for. most recommend 50% but I do know people that run 70% and claim it works as long as its not hot out when it gets too hot the plastic gets soft and while wrapping the wrapp breaks allot and you have to get off and retie the wrapp to the bale. If you run 50% stretch at 6 layers you get about 22 bales per roll. Now there are different lengths of rolls ( just came out in my area so I don't know too much about them yet)

If you bale too dry it can mold around 15%-30% moisture is the bad point some people claim that spraying fixes this problem but I don't spray so I don't Know. Older over ripe grasses seem to be more susceptible to molding when too dry mostly on the out side of the bale between the hay and the plastic. But this mold doesn't seem to go very deep into the bale 1-3 layers of hay maybe and inside it tends to still be good. so if you can get past the outside being ugly there is still good feed in side. So just to be safe if your bailing over grown grasses bale it a bit wetter.

Make sure that any holes in the bales from being moved or from birds get taped up and re sealed to keep the air out.

As for the wrapper that this post is about I wound not use it you need two tractors two operators and it doesn't really move all that well for transport. I like my tow behind wrapper because one person one tractor can pick up 2 bales at a time drive to one spot in the field wrapp and dump all the bales in one spot then if you have a loader or skid steer one more guy and you can stack them up right there

there are 3 different kinds of individual bale wrappers

twin arm






single or double roll tow behind






square bale wrapper or round both






what can I say silage is big around here. now others make this stuff as well but mchale makes the best by far

feel free to ask any questions and i'll try my best to answer them


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

I know this thread is getting a little old but I did find the manufacturers website. It's made in Poland. Wife and son are still thinking about getting a wrapper. Looks like their up to about $5400 now.

Main site with all their hay equipment

http://www.metalfach.com.pl/en/oferta

Wrapper

http://www.metalfach.com.pl/en/oferta/owijarki/z-560


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## IH 1586 (Oct 16, 2014)

C & C Cattle and Hay said:


> I was thinkn about purchasing a wrapper. Do you have to wrap them that much? How much is the wrap per roll? How many bales can you do per roll?


I wrap 4x4 bales individual and get about 25 bales to a roll. Wrap each bale 3 times. The 2 other people here locally only wrap theirs twice. I know they recommend up to six layers of plastic.


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## swmnhay (Jun 13, 2008)

We just met with rep from Agri Seal.They had tests showing the optimum wraps (the least heating) was from 8 mils of wrap total.Any more then that it didn't help but for each wrap less it showed more heating.

Some wraps are layered to give them added strength,like 3 ply.

Some poor netwrap may be thinner in spots causing it to break when stretching or just thinner allows more heating.there machine keeps tolerance of 5% on thickness.

We've been trying a few brands to handle and went with Agri Seal because of quality and price.

Have a load of 1.2m x30" with plastic tubes comeing now.


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## snowball (Feb 7, 2015)

This is a subject that I enjoyed reading about everyone point of view on ,As a buyer at the hay auctions in my area the silage bales most always sell for 50 to 60% less then dry hay . I like buying it but I like to make sure I have a good supply to keep the cows on it. Bouncing back&forth is hard on them . I've found also they don't really like to go back to dry hay after they've been offered silage bales, I also thinking about buying a wrapper, I could get my fair share of custom wrapping , But That means drop what I'am doing and go wrap hay on a Saturday night before it rains 20 bales here 30 bales there all night long untill you done or rained out, I like the single bale wrapper ( just for myself ) but takes a min of 2 good people and now a $2500 bale grabber and skid loader or loader and a baler that will bale silage bales and real good bale feeders It all adds up quickly. I'am still giving it some serious thought. I need to make up my mind soon as it will help determine what baler I need to buy


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## Supa Dexta (May 28, 2014)

I have an old wrapper, of no real name brand. But it's worked well for us for over 20yrs now. Takes one guy running it and one guy loading and taking away bales can do around 30 bales an hour. I get about 30 bales per roll, and the wrapper spins 23 revolutions per bale, to get the coverage we want.

I seldom do more than say 50-80 in a day so its a few hours of wrapping each day. Slow compared to new machines, but still only half an evenings work if I bale in the afternoon and have someone haul bales to the yard.

Dry hay I'll pound out a lot more bales in a day, but when wrapping you need to take into consideration the wrap time ahead. If I was inline wrapping, or had a newer faster single wrapper, I could knock off 100 fairly easy by myself in a day. But I only wrap around 600 a year, so I'm not in that big of rush. Most I've ever done alone with my machine was 140 some in a weekend, that was with hauling them 15km back to the farm too.


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## MDill (Feb 8, 2015)

Check out the Agland wrapper too. It can be mounted on either a 3pt hitch or a skidsteer. A lot cheaper than a trailed wrapper but still self loading unlike most 3pt wrappers.
I do about 800 balage bales a year at work with a McHale 991BJS. It is a very nice wrapper, and I can finish a field of bales in no time at all. There are a couple gripes I have about it though, one is the adjustment bolts on the table. If you drop a heavy bale on the table from too high it will push the rollers that the belts ride on, in and rip the wrap on the bale. Maybe they've fixed this on the newer models, but it can be frustrating when you are just trying to get done.
The other is that you need a free flow valve on your tractor, we had to add a dump valve to the JD 5083e that we wrap with. These wrappers move a lot of fluid.
Just something to keep in mind when comparing trailed or 3pt wrappers is that after the bales are wrapped you aren't supposed to move them for 60-90 days. I prefer to not move them until feeding so I don't rip any by accident.but the trailed wrappers give you more flexibility. I use our trailed wrapper as a stationary wrapper the majority of the time, loading with a skidsteer. But the fields further away I wrap in the field and dump the bales in a corner, and stack them later that week.


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## MDill (Feb 8, 2015)

Sorry maybe it's a Farmland wrapper not an Agland.


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## Dill (Nov 5, 2010)

Not a bad deal on the 3pth wrappers, this guy is tossing a grabber in as well 6200 for the combo.

http://westernmass.craigslist.org/grq/4880745235.html


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