Is doing a silage operation worth it?

[Frantic Farmer]

Wrapped round silage bales is a nice income boost for starting situations, when you have little else. I did that too and was able to buy better tractors and more fields because of it.

But once you get a lot of cows, sheep and pigs and larger/more fields it is really wasted time selling wrapped silage. And do not forget the greenhouses if you have manure production ....those are really overlooked when it comes to generating a lot of income for little work.

When you have cows and greenhouses, the folly of selling sialge becomes clear

I only have 2 greenhouses they only seem to do £450. Might get some more.

[JohnDeere318]

Wrapped round silage bales is a nice income boost for starting situations, when you have little else. I did that too and was able to buy better tractors and more fields because of it.

But once you get a lot of cows, sheep and pigs and larger/more fields it is really wasted time selling wrapped silage. And do not forget the greenhouses if you have manure production ....those are really overlooked when it comes to generating a lot of income for little work.

Oh ok. I have $600,000+ right now, so I think I might be fine, I don't know though. But yeah I think I will get cows.

[pigpen]

I don't do much crop farming. the 3 default fields on the Goldcrest map 2 of them are planted to populars the other 1 is planted to saplings. I own 2 fields by the dairy farm. one field is planted to grass the other is split into 2 fields for corn and wheat. I don't own a combine I picked the forage harvester instead. I just lease a combine. so I have plenty of time to make silage for both the cows and the BGA. making wrapped bales is easy all you need is a front mower and a round baler along with a wrapper.

[TopSoil]

I've started doing corn silage a couple weeks ago. The forage harvester is not cheap! The next problem is if you do too much, you wreck the price of silage at the BGA.

However, I think I'm in a decent rhythm with it now.

Can do 300k or so silage just about every game day without completely ruining the price, so I average about 300 dollars per liter, which means just shy of 100k income per day on Normal.

It's a fair bit of work - different harvester, picking the right amount to plant, all the trips from the field to BGA, compressing, etc.

I use the conveyors. I needed 4 of them plus the pickup to reliably get all of the silage out of the silos. It takes time, and you have to move stuff around a fair bit as the machine that picks it up off the ground has to be moved, and all the others have to be moved to maintain connected line to the digester.

But, it's 100k per day and you end up in my view making more money out of it than simply harvesting corn or wheat on that field. You get about 7-8 times as much chaff from a field as you get corn. Silage prices are 1/2 to 2/3rd of corn prices. So the amount of money is at least triple on a per field basis ... but the extra work does take real time that you could otherwise be doing other harvesting or even just rolling time faster to mature the next crop.

I have one grass field I use for feeding animals, and sometimes making silage bales for easy sale. When I don't need hay/grass or immediate silage bale money to buy something, I simply add in the grass to my next BGA silo pile and it turns into money when fermented and gone up the conveyors. Easy peasy.

I see it as content, and I'm happy to have this functionality to round out the things available on my farm.

And since you have to buy a forage harvester, that immediately opens up poplar farming as well, another added feature of FS17 -- and kinda similar in ways, as you get a LOT of wood chips from a field, and thus have to make many trips to the sawmill or placeable furnace, and there are issues with knocking the price down if you do too much.

All in all, it feels like managing a farm with some additional complexity and required activities -- a better game and more fun because of it.

[JohnDeere318]

Thanks for that @TopSoil! I was able to edit the price to make it not go down and make it like FS15. :chinese:

[mayoollie]

All of ours goes into the biogas plant. Grass and maize silage. You need a chopper and a lot of trailer jockeys to make it work, and a patient pit man.

Once you have got the tools though, it's easy you just have to keep feeding it into the biogas plant.

[JohnDeere318]

You need a chopper and a lot of trailer jockeys to make it work.

All I am using is the Krone tipper, hooking it up to the back of the NH FR850 and hiring a worker to do corn. I am lazy indeed.

[mayoollie]

You need a chopper and a lot of trailer jockeys to make it work.

All I am using is the Krone tipper, hooking it up to the back of the NH FR850 and hiring a worker to do corn. I am lazy indeed.

You should give that up and just join our game instead. I am about to start mowing for hay making.

[Dogface]

I use a tractor with a mower on the front and a loading wagon in tow. I mow the grass next to fields and roads. This is a very cheap way to get FREE grass, with small investment. You will need to buy a way to put the silage into the sell-point. I use conveyor belts, which work REALLY well. I find silage very profitable for the capital investment. I have not yet bought my first field, and I dont have a lot to do on the first three fields, so I spend my time working on silage and forestry.

$800 is a fantastic price! But that changes over time, yes? It does for me (PC).

[TopSoil]

Thanks for that @TopSoil! I was able to edit the price to make it not go down and make it like FS15. :chinese:

Hey JD - what attribute is it exactly that you change to prevent selling volume to impact price? I never bothered to figure that out, always assumed it had to do with that list of fruits and "amount sold" or something else in the careersavegame file.

[JohnDeere318]

Thanks for that @TopSoil! I was able to edit the price to make it not go down and make it like FS15. :chinese:

Hey JD - what attribute is it exactly that you change to prevent selling volume to impact price? I never bothered to figure that out, always assumed it had to do with that list of fruits and "amount sold" or something else in the careersavegame file.

Here is the directory: C:\Program Files (x86)\Farming Simulator 2017\data\maps; map01.xml

I edited this with Notepad++ (this is just an example sell point):

Code: Select all

        <tipTrigger index="TOWN_BAKERY" stationName="station_townBakeryGCV" appearsOnPDA="true" isAreaTrigger="true" isSellingPoint="true" triggerWidth="3" litersForFullPriceDrop="100000" fullPriceRecoverHours="48">
            <fillType name="wheat"            priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="barley"           priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="rape"             priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="sunflower"        priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="soybean"          priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="maize"            priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="potato"           priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />
            <fillType name="sugarBeet"        priceScale="1" supportsGreatDemand="true" disablePriceDrop="true" />

I think that's what makes it not go down, is by typing "true" and replacing "false" by the "disablePriceDrop", but not sure because I have not done anything yet, in the moment of planting corn right now. But I will be sure to tell you when I get to that point.

[TopSoil]

cool thanks

[JohnDeere318]

cool thanks

Your welcome.

[masterplan]

I haven't read all the previous answers, but many pepople say that you can get the same amount of money by simply seeding something else, harvesting and selling. Now I won't argue with that, they're probably right. But it's the same all over again. Doing silage is something different and I like it. You'll have plenty of money stashed in the silage bunker for later. The starting price for forage harvester etc. is high, but it will pay for itself.

I do silage this way:
Got the Krone Big X 1100 mod forage harvester with corn header and the Krone tipper. The specialized Krone tipper is optional, you can use any tipper. I always keep at least one pit full (full means over 2 000 cubic meters of silage) and another one... Well what's left there from the original 2 000 cubics.

Maybe find some videos of compacting, I was struggling with it in the beggining, it wants some practise, but once you find out how to do it, it's easy.

For selling, I prefer JCB wheel-loader with 10 cubics silage fork. Some prefer conveyors, I've tried them and I don't.
Now the essential part is when to sell. I play on normal difficulty and sell only when the price is above 400 per cubic. The highest price I observed (and I regularly get - from time to time) is 493. If you start at the highest price, you can sell imho approx. 200 cubics and the price drops to 400. That makes a profit of approx 90 000.
Also: if you're in need of money and have a lot of silage and the price *censored*, try saving and reloading the game. On PS4, the price for silage seems randomized each time you load the game.

You also get so called digestate, which is an equivalent to slurry. I think you get 1/3 of sold silage, meaning if you sell 300 cubics of silage, you get 100 cubics of digestate. Same as slurry, 12 cubics of digestate will fertilize one hectar.

So as for me: yes, the silage operation is worth and I like it.

[JohnDeere318]

Ok, I have started the silage operation last night and I am having fun with it! So much different and I am getting a stuff load of chaff! I have the 3 default fields, F3, F4, F7, and F8. I have only started on 12 and 14 and still haven't finished them yet because they are filling up so quick! I just put the Krone trailer on the back of the NH FR 850, hire a worker, and when it gets full, I just back up, unhitch it, hook the tractor up to it, take it to BGA, unload, and repeat.