How Much Forage You Need for Winter — Estimating Your Requirement

One of the most common questions before the cold season: "how many tons do I need?" There's no universal answer, but there is a simple guideline formula that gets you very close to the real figure. Use it as a starting point for planning — the exact quantity depends on the farm's complete ration, which your nutritionist sets.

The guideline formula

For a corn silage requirement estimate, you start from three numbers:

Head count × daily intake (kg) × housing days = tons needed

• Guideline silage intake: roughly 20–25 kg per head per day for a dairy cow.
• Winter period: generally 150–180 days, depending on region and farm.

As a calculation reference, we use 22 kg/head/day and 165 days.

Examples across herd sizes

With the formula above (22 kg × 165 days ≈ 3.6 tons per head per season):

• 20 cows ≈ 73 tons
• 50 cows ≈ 180 tons
• 100 cows ≈ 360 tons
• 200 cows ≈ 730 tons

These are guideline figures for silage as the energy base. To them you add the protein source (lucerne hay or haylage), calculated separately — for lucerne, intake is usually much smaller, around 2–4 kg/head/day in the base ration.

What makes the figure vary

The estimate above is a starting point, not a recipe. The real requirement changes according to:

• The cows' production level (a high-yield cow eats more).
• The rest of the ration — how much silage, how much hay, how much concentrate.
• The actual housing duration on your farm.
• Animal categories (lactation, gestation, young stock).

That's why the exact figure is set by the specialist who sees the animals. We give you the sizing calculation and help you match the products — the final ration balance stays with the nutritionist.

Why reserving early matters

A practical point that's not about nutrition but about availability: last season, silage stock sold out as early as March. Those who waited too long went without. If you estimate your requirement early and reserve the quantity, you secure your forage for the whole winter — and on large orders, transport is optimized across truck groups, which means a lower cost per ton.

You can use the requirement and transport calculators on the site for a quick estimate, then write to us for the exact figure for your farm.

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