Barry Yaremcio, beef and forage specialist, Ag-Info Centre, Alberta Agriculture and Food, Stettler, Alberta, provided this answer:

The moisture probes that you stick into bales or are in the chambers of square balers, obtain readings from the forage using an electric current differential. It measures the moisture on the exterior of the stem and leaves, and not what is in the inside of the stem. When you tested the hay after baling, the heat evaporated much of the surface moisture and you obtained a low reading. The next morning, after the moisture migrated out of the stem to the leaves and outer surfaces, you obtain a much more accurate reading.

If a hay crop is cut for only two or three days and is not properly cured, you will receive an artificially low indication of moisture content.

To determine if the hay is cured, take a handful of hay out of the middle to lower section of the windrow and hold it lengthwise as a sheaf in both hands with the cut end of the stocks extending out one hand and the leaf and heads out of the other hand. Grasp the hay somewhere in the middle of the stock, keeping your thumbs approximately 2-3” apart with palms downward, try to break the sheaf in two (no different than breaking a pencil). If the stems crack (audible to the ear), it is an indication that the hay is cured. If the hay bends and does not crack, it is not ready to bale.

Another test is to have the hay the same as above, with hands 4-5” apart, make circular motions no different than what your feet make when peddling a bicycle. If all the stems sever after four or five rotations, the hay is ready to bale.

To double-check your moisture tester, use the microwave to test 100 grams of product. The protocol is at http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/for4908.

Compare the reading you get from the probe to what the microwave test provides. For example, if the tester indicates 14 % and the microwave indicates 18%, then you know your probe is reading 4 % low. Adjust your hay moisture accordingly.

Remember, hay will go through a "secondary" sweat after it is baled. This will last for two to four days. After this period of time, the hay should be stable and moisture levels should not fluctuate. It is still important to have the moisture levels low enough at baling to prevent long-term problems.

Our Web site searching found that oats, at milk stage, contain a mliky substance in seeds. To confirm that, here's what we found from the University of Florida extension on harvesting small grains for silage, taken from its Web site at http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/DS155:

"There are typically three stages of identifiable plant maturities at which small grains are harvested - boot, milk, and dough stages. The boot stage is the time when the head is enclosed by the sheath of the uppermost leaf. The milk stage is when the grain head releases a white liquidy substance when opened. The grain head continues to lay down carbohydrates so that its consistency becomes more dough-like thus the label 'dough stage'."

Have you tried the Organic Seed Database (http://seeds.omri.org/index.php?List=Suppliers)? You can put in the crop you're interested in buying and get a list of suppliers. There's also a handy resource button on the left-hand column on the Web site's home page that offers other sites to find organic seed. Good luck on your project!

If you’re looking for perennial crops to winter-graze, tall fescue is “the gold standard” in Missouri, says Rob Kallenbach, University of Missouri extension forage specialist. “Tall fescue is the one that can be stockpile grazed, where basically we accumulate forage growth from mid-August through the end of the growth cycle in autumn and we can graze it through winter,” he says.

Perennial ryegrass is his next choice. But this grass doesn’t have long-term persistence in the humid areas of the U.S. and doesn’t have as much growth as tall fescue in autumn. Orchardgrass, he adds, would be his third pick for late-autumn or winter grazing. “There are limitations to all of those in terms of forage quality, not so much on the protein side as on the energy side of the equation,” he adds.

“If you want higher quality, use some annual species,” Kallenbach says. The most widely used is winter rye or winter wheat. “Winter rye can be seeded for forage towards the tail end of August to the first of September in this environment. And if we would grow it in autumn and graze it through winter, its quality will be substantially over any of those perennial species that I mentioned.”

Wheat is another good annual grazing crop “We get a lot of winter pasture on wheat in the High Plains but it could be used in the more humid regions as well.” Annual ryegrss can be used from the Missouri River south, and in the entire southeastern U.S., triticale, a cross of rye and wheat, works, too, he says.

For information on stockpiling fall and winter pasture, download
www.ca.uky.edu/agc/pubs/agr/agr162/agr162.pdf. To learn more on stockpiling tall fescue, visit
http://forages.oregonstate.edu/is/tfis/book.cfm?PageID=366&chapter=15§ion=0.

"I visited with several coworkers about this and our consensus is that there would be several problems," says Gerald Evers, a pasture management specialist with Texas AgriLife Research and Extension Center, Texas A&M. "A bermudagrass trial in Uvalde, TX, had problems with rodents chewing the underground drip line seeking the moisture. When there is a break in the drip line one has to dig to find and repair it. Salt in the water could stop up the emitters. The 40" spacings are not a problem because bermudagrass roots can grow down to 6-10' deep if the soil is that deep. Because of the expense, we would suggest doing an acre or two to see how it works before doing a large area."