Bredspridning av grönmassa

Abstract: There are a great possibility to shorten the time between mowing and preservation by spreading of ley crops in connection to the conditioning. In this case the cellular respiration (the plants breeding that consume sugar until the crop is ensiled) should not continue as long and the forage will perhaps get a higher nutritional value. The capacity of the next machine could also be higher because the rake gives swaths with a lot of material. There is also a possibility that spreading of ley crops gives the material a more homogeneous content of dry matter and that gives a reduced growth of clostridium. This is particularly important when the method of harvest doesn't include any mixing of the material like it does with a round baler or silagewagon. A possible risk with spreading of ley crops is if the rake mix earth, manure and litter in the green crop. Spreading of ley is used at many places in Europe, but the quality criteria of the dairy company is often not as high as in Sweden. For that reason we choose to gather the experiences from milk producers in Sweden that not practice, drying forage in swath. We have done this with a questionnaire that has been answered over the telephone. Our purpose was to interview farmers from all over Sweden. By our literature study we can establish that spreading of ley crops doesn't involve a higher risk that earth, manure and litter will be mixed in the swath. This is quite right with the results in our interviews. This is because non of the farms in our study has problems with spores in the milk. The disadvantage in spreading of ley crops is that it could give a higher risk for microbiological contamination. The system is slightly delicate to uneven fields, piles made by common mole, wild boar damages and occurrence of stones. Another problem is that the raking result an extra drive and cost from a expensive machine. Another disadvantage is that spreading of ley crops can't be recommended to farmers witch has humus rich soil. The reason to this is that our study shows that spreading of ley crops on these fields increase the hygiene problem with forage. It is therefore recommended to dry the green crop in untouched swaths if it has to be given to milking cattle. The conclusions of our study is that spreading of ley crops leads to a faster increase of dry matter, increased capacity of the following machine and its easier to achieve a higher and more even content of dry matter. All of this leads to a shorter time between mower conditioning and preservation and this means that the dependent of the weather is reduced, higher value of the forage and a slighter loss because of cellular respiration. In our study farms is included that has small moraine fields. Spreading of ley crops works well in these places to which indicate that the system works under most conditions.