grass silege as a green?

[charlie@vt]

I am hoping to get an early start with a new compost setup this spring. I have located Horse/straw manure combo and plenty of brown paper bags, leaves exc. however the green part is another matter.
I then though of grass silege. The farms in my area have large bunkers of it for winter feed of dariy cows. Could this satisfy the green ingredient for my compost pile?

PS: I would use the spillege from the loading and transport of the silege to the feed bunkers.

[TZ -OH6]

I've never heard of grass sillage before, how is that different from hay?

[rot]

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Don't know about grass silage. What is the source? If it really comes from grass then that's a lot of nitrogen.

Other stuff that might be found in your neck of the woods may be listed in the URL below. The lower the number in the second column, the higher the nitrogen value.

https://compost.css.cornell.edu/OnFarmHandbook/apa.taba1.html

to sense
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[rainbowgardener]

If by horse/straw manure combo, you mean like bedding from stables, it's already pretty green. (That's why the terms are misleading. You wouldn't think it to look at the stuff, but manure is definitely "green" not "brown." ) The straw is "brown" but it not only has manure mixed in, but it is soaked in urine. So at least it's pretty balanced all by itself.

[applestar]

If I remember correctly, silage is fermented feed -- often made with hay, or sugarbeet/sugarcane after squeezing out the juice for sugar-making, and something else... corn stalks? (maybe not any more since they're using that for other stuff?) It raises the nutritional value and is good for bovine feed. I believe there IS some alcoholic content, unless they stir that up and let the alcohol dissipate.

I was leasing a horse at a stable where they did cattle herding games and the feed had a very distinct smell -- not entirely unpleasant... so I know what you mean about spillage. I suspect that silage would make an excellent compost ingredient, but I'm not sure about GREEN or BROWN. I did notice someone here mentioning recently that high protein=GREEN. It seems to me that silage would be GREEN?

[charlie@vt]

the silege I am talking about is Timothy hay/grass & Alfalfa chopped @ about 8 to 12" tall. It is just slighty damp, no juice like a silo.

[Toil]

use it! It's basically like bokashi. It should heat right up in a compost pile. I treat my bokashi pretty much like manure. Gotta watch it in the worm bin or I cook em.

[charlie@vt]

Thanks all for your info. Its a go for next weekend.

[Clea Walford]

I don't know how large your compost bins are, but whenever I add anything that might not mix well, I add a little sand to loosen it up. Fine grasses that have not dried completely tend to clump.

[charlie@vt]

sand could be helpful as I have alot of news print & cardboard right now anyway. my new bin will be aproximently 4' x 4'.

[rot]

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"the silege I am talking about is Timothy hay/grass & Alfalfa"

Yeah that's green.

Keep the newspaper & cardboard handy if things appear too green.

Mix well if clumping is a concern. Newspaper clumps on me all the time.

to sense
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[Toil]

the great thing about a clump of silage is that it is completely covered in lactobacilli. So it doesn't putrefy in anaerobic conditions. Too late for that! The LAB are dominant organisms, and methane producing bacteria have no chance.

I make tight mounds of bokashi compost (like silage in anaerobic fermentation but made of composite OM, ergo the word compost) in my worm bins. I specifically aim to keep the mound anaerobic as long as I can, while the worms work their way through.

So don't wory too much about clumping.