Machine capacities and costs for silage harvest in Swedish milk production : Effects of timing and costs of being late

Abstract

The research presented here explored machinery, labour and timeliness costs in harvest of forage for organic and conventional milk production. The choice of machinery capacity is an offset between high machine costs due to large machines and timeliness costs due to low machine capacity. Timeliness costs are caused by decreased quality or quantity of the crop and arise when an operation is performed at an un-optimal time. An initial study showed that in organic milk production timeliness costs were similar in size to labour costs. Timeliness costs were calculated by constructing a model that combined the dry matter production of grass-clover forage at different harvest dates with the change in value of the forage depending on change in nutrient content of the forage. The forage value at different cutting dates was calculated by making fodder plans and deciding fodder costs for forage harvested at two different cutting times. The optimal harvest dates was calculated by maximising the value of the harvest. Weather data for 10 subsequent years was used to examine annual yield variations. The calculations were made for three cuttings per season in the middle and in the south of Sweden and for two cuttings in the north of Sweden. Different machinery systems were explored. Firstly, the forage was cut with a mower conditioner. The forage was then harvested using a forage wagon or a forage harvester loading the forage into a separate wagon. The forage was preserved as silage in round bales or in bunker silos. When harvesting forage for organic milk production in the south central part of Sweden timeliness costs constituted 15% of total machine costs. One weeks delay from the optimal harvest date increased timeliness costs with about 40%. The harvest capacity and cost is influenced by factors like the matching of harvest and transport capacity, labour arrangements and transport distances

Conference

65th International Conference on Agricultural Engineering

SLU Authors

• Gunnarsson, Carina

  • Department of Energy and Technology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Spörndly, Rolf

  • Department of Applied Animal Science and Welfare, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Hansson, Per-Anders

  • Department of Energy and Technology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Agricultural Science

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/16914