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FAQ #28931

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Baled wet Rye grass (375 small sqares). Because of bad weather some bales are starting to show mold. How much of this is bad for beef cows? Should I not feed it or should I mix it with other non moldy hay? How much mold is too much per bale?

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Management and feeding recommendatios are as follows:

1. spread the bales out as they can get hot and start on fire if they are really wet

2. let them go through the 3 week sweat

3. test the hay for quality - moisture, energy (TDN), crude protein, and heat damaged protein- heat can cause the protein to be unavailable to the animal and labs using NIR can test for that

4) you may want to test for nitrates

In most cases, the level of mold is such that moldy hay can be blended with non-moldy hay and fed to cows without problems. Feeding young calves and pregnant cows much moldy hay. It would probably be ok to use in feedlot rations, as many of those rations, when calves get on full feed, are only 10% to 15% forage.

How much is to much mold? Tough question to answer. If you think it is excessive, get ahold of your extension educator and ask who you can contact at the university to help you with sampling and where to analyze the sample.

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