Straw is the most under-thought crop most operations make. The combine is already in the field, the material is already on the ground, and there's a real market for it — but the guys who make money at it treat straw like a crop, not an afterthought. Bale it wrong and you get soft, springy rolls that unravel on the truck, a customer who's unhappy about chaff, and a fertilizer bill next spring that you didn't budget for.
This guide walks through baling straw the way growers on the hay forums actually do it: how to set the combine, when the straw is ready, what yield to expect, what the nutrients are worth, and why straw eats more net wrap than hay does.
Set the combine up before you think about the baler
Almost every straw problem starts at the back of the combine. If the chopper and spreader are running, the straw is shredded and scattered across the full header width — which is exactly what you want if you're building soil and exactly what you don't want if you're baling. The fix is simple and it happens before the first round.
- Shut off the straw chopper and the spreader. Long straw dropped in a swath is far easier to pick up and worth more in the bedding market.
- Cut a little lower. More stem into the machine means more straw on the ground — though it's a trade-off, and it isn't always the right one (more on that below).
- Narrow the windrow with baffles. A 30- or 40-foot header dumping into an unrestricted swath makes a windrow wider than your baler pickup. Baffles on the back of the combine tighten it up.
"Guys around here run baffles on the back of the combine to narrow the windrow as it falls out of the tail end. It doesn't take much."
— 8350HiTech, on HayTalk
Baling directly behind the combine — same day, no raking — is common where the crop is dry and the weather is settled, and it saves a trip across the field. One no-till double-cropper described the whole system in a sentence:
"I have a walker style combine JD9500 just for wheat, oats and barley. I just disconnect the straw chopper and go… We usually bale right behind the combine. Biggest problem is getting the windrow into the baler… I don't want to make any more trips than I have to because of compaction issues."
— NDVA HAYMAN, on HayTalk
In double-crop country the sequence gets even tighter. A south Louisiana grower runs three machines nose to tail: "Often we have the combine followed by the square baler with the no-till bean planter right behind the baler. Have the combine cut closer to the ground and turn off the chopper so it leaves a nice windrow."
One caution if you're baling someone else's straw: the landowner usually wants the field clean, not cherry-picked. As one grower put it, "they are fussy here — if they turn the straw chopper off, the deal will include that the field has to be cleaned up completely. No wads left in corners or leaving once you get the number of bales you want."
Walker vs. rotary: what it does to your straw
This is the single biggest quality variable in straw, and it's decided by whatever combine happens to be in the field. A conventional walker machine threshes gently and lays down long, intact straw with relatively little chaff. A rotary chews the crop as it goes around, so the straw comes out shorter, softer, and mixed with a lot more loose material.
That difference shows up in the bale and in the price:
| Combine type | Straw you get | Market effect |
|---|---|---|
| Walker (conventional) | Long, intact stems, less chaff | Preferred for bedding and mulch; usually brings a premium |
| Rotary | Short, broken, chaffy | Spreads easily for bedding and mulch, but bales soft and sells for less |
"Small bales behind a rotor combine 30 ft head. Makes lots of loose chaff. Walker machines make much nicer straw to bale although some of our customers like how easy the rotor straw spreads out for mulch and bedding."
— haygrower, Washington, on HayTalk
Growers who sell into the long-straw trade know the difference is worth real money — one grower reported getting about "$60 per ton if I am lucky for barley straw out of a conventional walker combine (long, no chaff straw). Otherwise, straw is about $40 per ton." If you're buying straw in the windrow, ask what threshed it before you bid.
When to bale: the moisture window
Straw feels dry the moment it leaves the combine, and that fools people. The stems that were standing green an hour ago still carry internal moisture, and the bottom of a fresh swath sits on damp stubble. Bale it too soon and you get a hot, musty bale that molds in the stack.
The published guidance from grain-belt extension programs is to bale wheat straw below 20% moisture, with 12–18% as the comfortable working range. That is a bit more forgiving than dry hay because straw is nearly all stem with very little leaf sugar to feed mold, but it is not a license to bale wet.
In practice that usually means waiting. A custom baler who ran large rounds of winter wheat straw for several seasons put the timing plainly:
"Usually the straw needed to lay a day or two to dry. Once I needed to flop the windrows over with a wheel rake to get the bottom of the swath dry. If the grain cart rode on the row it didn't dry very well."
— Gearclash, on HayTalk
That grain-cart detail is worth repeating: wherever a loaded cart tracked across the swath, the straw is packed down and stays wet long after the rest of the field is ready. Walk those strips before you commit the baler.
Another small-square grower described a clean routine that works in humid country: "We small square bale behind 30 foot walker combine, like to wait one day if weather permits, then rake and bale single windrows. If the straw is thin, double it." Raking two thin rows together also fixes the other common problem — a windrow too light to feed the baler evenly, which makes soft, barrel-shaped bales.
If you use a moisture meter for hay, use it on straw too; the reading habits carry over. Our hay moisture tester guide covers how to sample so the number means something, and baling moisture for net-wrapped bales explains why a tight round bale is less forgiving of extra moisture than a small square.
Straw that got rained on
Rain on straw in the windrow is annoying but rarely fatal — straw has no leaf to shatter and no protein to leach, so the losses are cosmetic and structural rather than nutritional. It goes gray, it mats down, and it needs to be opened up.
- Flip the windrow. A wheel rake or rotary rake run at a good clip turns the wet underside up to the sun. That single pass is usually what gets you baling a day sooner.
- Watch what a rotary rake does to short straw. Rotary combines already broke it up; aggressive raking breaks it further and costs you the long-straw premium.
- Rained-on straw isn't worthless for bedding. Weathered straw is more absorbent than bright straw — bedding buyers care about absorbency and bulk more than color.
- Bright straw still sells better. Landscape, mulch, and retail bagged-bale customers buy with their eyes, so keep your cleanest, brightest rolls for that trade.
Once it's baled, the rest of the job is storage. Straw is bulky, cheap per ton, and gets stacked outside more often than hay does, which makes wrap quality and stacking discipline matter. The principles are the same as for hay — see outdoor hay bale storage.
How much straw will you actually get?
Straw yield tracks grain yield, cut height, and how much of the plant the combine leaves standing. Typical wheat straw removal runs about 1.5–2.5 tons per acre, with the full range across crops and conditions spanning roughly 1 to 4 tons. In round numbers, that's something like:
| Bale type | Rough bales per acre at ~2 tons/ac |
|---|---|
| Small squares (~40 lb) | ~80–100 |
| 4×5 round (~600 lb of straw) | ~6–7 |
| 5×6 round (~900 lb of straw) | ~4–5 |
| 3×3×8 big square (~700 lb) | ~5–6 |
Treat those as planning numbers, not promises — straw bales are notoriously light and variable in density, and a soft round of chaffy rotary straw can weigh half what a tight roll of long walker straw does. Growers commonly report small-square yields in the neighborhood of 3 to 5 bales per acre where the deal is per-bale off a light crop, and far more where the crop is heavy and cut low. Weigh a few bales the first year and build your own numbers.
What the straw costs the field
This is the part that gets skipped, and it's the part that decides whether baling straw was profitable. Straw isn't free residue; it's a nutrient export. Published removal figures for cereal straw run roughly:
| Nutrient | Removed per ton of straw | At 2 tons/acre |
|---|---|---|
| Nitrogen (N) | ~11–12 lb | ~22–24 lb |
| Phosphate (P2O5) | ~3.3–3.7 lb | ~7 lb |
| Potash (K2O) | ~24–29 lb | ~48–58 lb |
Potassium is the one that stings. Straw is a potash sponge, and hauling 50-odd pounds of K2O per acre off the field year after year will show up in your soil tests. Price the replacement at current fertilizer values and you have the real floor under what straw is worth in the windrow — which is exactly how experienced growers frame it.
"Remember that the more straw you take, the more nutrients you take. Since we double crop, I like to leave higher stubble to plant into."
— NDVA HAYMAN, on HayTalk
There's a second cost that doesn't show on a soil test: organic matter and erosion protection. On erodible ground, or in a no-till system that leans on residue, the right answer may be to bale lightly, cut higher, or skip some fields entirely. Straw removal is a decision, not a default.
Net wrap on straw: plan on more turns
Here's the practical thing nobody tells first-time straw balers: straw needs more net wrap than hay does. Grass and alfalfa stems are slightly rough and knit together as the bale forms. Straw is the opposite — waxy, slick, springy, and (behind a rotary) short. It doesn't lock together, so the finished bale pushes outward against the net and tries to spring back the second it leaves the chamber.
The people who sell net for a living say the same thing farmers say:
"2 on hay, 3 on corn stalks is what I normally put on and recommend. Rotary wheat straw 4."
— swmnhay, on HayTalk
The same grower gets more specific elsewhere: "Alfalfa and grass hay 2.25, cornstalks 3.25, rotary wheat straw 4.25 — short, chopped up, dry material may need an extra wrap." Others land in the same neighborhood from different directions — "I do 3 on straw (from a rotary combine) and 2 on wet or dry hay," and, on the lighter end, "2¼ wraps will hold a good bale, but slick straw you may want 2½."
Our own guidance matches: silage 2–2.5 wraps, dry hay 2.5–3, straw 3–4. The full crop-by-crop breakdown, including how bale diameter changes the math, is in how many wraps per bale.
A few straw-specific wrapping notes worth knowing:
- Short, chaffy rotary straw needs the most wraps. Long walker straw knits better and can get by with less.
- Thin windrows make the problem worse. A light row of slick straw struggles to start a bale, and a bale that starts poorly finishes soft. Rake two thin rows into one.
- Net beats twine badly on outdoor straw. One grower's side-by-side: net-wrapped straw he bought that sat through freezing rain "peeled off with no problem," while his own twine-tied bales meant "using an axe and a crowbar to remove twine, and still did not get it all."
Slick straw can also fight the baler itself, especially on older machines. It's a well-known complaint:
"The straw tends to ride up the belts in the front of the machine and pile up on top. The straw also blocks the mechanism that applies the netwrap. I usually wind up using twine for straw since the twine arms do not get blocked… Alfalfa causes no such problems."
— Chipster22, on HayTalk
The replies in that thread point at the real cause and the fixes, and they apply to most belt balers, not just that one model. It isn't a missing shield — it's that slick straw won't roll over to start the core, so it squeezes up between the belt and the roller instead. What works: run bigger windrows, slow the PTO down (one operator suggested around 450 rpm) and gear up for ground speed to keep the chamber full, and ease off belt tension. As one grower summed it up: "If the straw has been chopped and is too short then it can be a real problem. I just baled 55 bales with no problems, but the straw was long and we had huge windrows."
Not sure which roll width your baler takes? The baler size checker matches your make and model to the right net wrap size.
Selling straw and the windrow deal
Straw sells into markets that have nothing to do with feed: bedding for dairy, beef, and horse barns; erosion control and pipeline reseeding; mushroom substrate; landscape mulch; even crawfish ponds in Louisiana. That mix is why straw prices can swing hard on non-agricultural demand — construction and pipeline work can pull a region's supply out from under the livestock buyers, and prices can drop just as fast when corn-stalk bales flood the bedding market.
Two structures dominate when you're baling somebody else's straw:
- Buy it in the windrow. You pay a flat rate per bale (or per ton) and keep everything you bale. Reported rates run from a few dollars a bale for light oat straw up to $10 a bale for good heavy rows.
- Share the crop. A 50/50 split of the finished bales between the landowner and the baler is common and keeps both parties honest about how much is actually there.
"They get around 3 to 5 bales per acre, he charges 5 dollars per bale out of the windrow for them to bale it… I've bought straw from a neighbor of mine and he charges me 10 dollars per bale to bale it… I've also baled some on shares for that same neighbor's dad, we've done a 50/50 share deal. Oat straw is certainly one of the best in my opinion."
— IHCman, on HayTalk
If you're baling small grains with feeding rather than bedding in mind, the calculus changes — see baling wheat for cattle for the forage side, ammoniating straw for turning low-quality straw into usable roughage, and bean straw feed and nutrient value for the residue side of a soybean rotation.
Frequently asked questions
What moisture should straw be baled at?
Bale straw below 20% moisture, with 12–18% as the comfortable target. Straw is nearly all stem and has little of the leaf sugar that feeds mold, so it tolerates slightly more moisture than dry hay — but a tight, dense round bale is less forgiving than a small square. The most common mistake is baling the same day the combine went through, before the bottom of the swath and the internal stem moisture have come down.
How many net wraps does a straw bale need?
Plan on 3 to 4 wraps for straw, compared with 2.5 to 3 for dry hay and 2 to 2.5 for silage. Straw stems are slick, waxy, and springy, so the material doesn't knit together the way grass or alfalfa does and pushes back hard against the net. Short, chaffy straw from a rotary combine needs the most; long straw from a walker machine holds together better.
How many bales of straw per acre?
At a typical 1.5–2.5 tons per acre of wheat straw, expect roughly 80–100 small squares, 6–7 4×5 round bales, or 4–5 5×6 round bales per acre. Light crops and per-bale windrow deals often run nearer 3 to 5 small squares an acre. Straw bale weights vary a lot with density and stem length, so weigh a few bales in your own conditions rather than trusting a chart.
Do I need to rake straw before baling?
Not always. If the combine dropped a clean, narrow, baler-width windrow and the straw is dry through, you can bale straight behind it and save a trip. Rake when the swath is too wide for your pickup, when two thin rows need combining into one to feed the baler evenly, or when the underside is still damp and needs flipping to the sun.
How many nutrients does baling straw remove?
Roughly 11–12 lb of nitrogen, 3.3–3.7 lb of phosphate, and 24–29 lb of potash per ton of straw removed. At 2 tons per acre that's about 22–24 lb N, 7 lb P2O5, and 48–58 lb K2O leaving the field. Potassium is the big one — price replacement potash at current values to set the floor for what straw is worth in the windrow.
Is straw from a rotary or a walker combine better?
Walker combines make better straw for baling: long, intact stems with less chaff, which bales tighter and brings a premium in the bedding and mulch markets. Rotary combines break the straw up, so it bales softer, needs more net wrap, and generally sells for less — although some bedding and mulch customers actually prefer how easily short rotary straw spreads out.
The bottom line
Baling straw pays when you treat it as a crop. Set the combine up first — chopper and spreader off, cut a bit lower, baffles to keep the windrow inside your pickup width. Give it a day or two to dry and flip the swath if the bottom is damp. Know your yield and price the nutrients you're hauling off, because that's the real cost. Then wrap it right: straw is slick and springy, so 3 to 4 turns of net, not the 2 to 2.5 you get away with on hay. Do those things and straw stops being a nuisance and starts being one of the easiest margins on the farm.
Wrapping straw this season? XES Netting makes heavy-duty bale net wrap engineered to hold tight on slick, springy material like straw and cornstalks — full-width edge-to-edge coverage that keeps rolls in shape from the field to the stack. Not sure which roll size your baler takes? Check the baler size checker. Shop net wrap →
Sources: Ohio State University Extension, agronomic crops guidance on wheat straw harvest moisture, yield and nutrient removal (accessed July 31, 2026); A&L Great Lakes Laboratories, crop nutrient removal reference values (accessed July 31, 2026). Grower quotes are verbatim from HayTalk.com discussion threads, linked above.
Image: "Stubble and round bales of straw" by Russel Wills, licensed CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
