Before to that, eight upright silos were filled with silage each year. We looked at putting up another upright or going with flat storage,'' says Scott Niess. Three years later, with 1,000 to 1,200 feeder cattle and 60 dairy cows to feed on their Mitchell County farms, the Niesses expanded storage again. They decided not to fill their uprights with corn silage and changed to high-moisture corn. They widened their bunker by 10 feet.
Maintenance is pretty low.
Quality of the Niess silage remains excellent, although they don't cover it with black plastic. Corn can be chopped sooner for the bunker than it can for silos. The Niesses begin harvesting 120 acres of corn silage about Labor Day, depending on the maturity of the corn. This spring, he plans to plant taller new hybrids to create more tonnage. Mitchell County farmer Scott Niess checks with seed suppliers for total digestible nutrient information in the corn they recommend for silage.