Short answer: Net wrap goes on first to hold the bale’s cylindrical shape; plastic stretch film goes over it to create the anaerobic seal that ferments the forage. The net keeps the bale from deforming during handling and transport, so the film can stay airtight. Skip the net and the film loses its seal at the first bump — that’s the failure most baleage guides don’t explain.
If you make baleage, you've already decided to wrap your bales in stretch film. The question most operators don't ask carefully enough is: **what holds the bale together underneath the film?**
Most baleage guides treat that decision as a footnote — "use twine or net wrap, then wrap with film." It's not a footnote. It's the difference between a clean feed-out next March and you spending 20 minutes per bale picking sisal out of frozen silage with cold fingers.
This post is the case for running net wrap as the inner layer, drawn directly from operators who've done it both ways and switched.
A note on scope. If you're comparing net wrap vs twine in general — cost per bale, baling speed, weather protection on outdoor dry-hay storage — start with our main net wrap vs twine comparison. This article is the baleage-specific deep dive: what the inner layer does in the 24 hours before wrapping, during fermentation, and at feed-out — after the bale leaves the chamber.
The two-layer baleage system in 30 seconds
A baleage bale has two distinct jobs to do:
- Hold its shape as it leaves the chamber, sits in the yard until you wrap it, and gets handled by a grapple or wrapper arms.
- Stay airtight for 6–12 months of anaerobic fermentation under plastic stretch film.
The inner layer (net wrap or twine) handles job #1. The outer layer (silage stretch film, usually 6–8 layers per industry consensus) handles job #2. They don't compete — they're a team.
The mistake is assuming both inner-layer options work equally well for the rest of the bale's life. They don't.
What farmers who switched said about it
Here's an unprompted observation from a Wisconsin operator who tried both:
"I used sisal and plastic twines under plastic wrap for a year or two on wet wrapped bales. The problem I had was finding the twine to take it all off when I took the plastic bale wrap off to feed. Netwrap is SO much easier to take off after removing the outer plastic wrap."
— WCWI, Driftless SW Wisconsin · AgTalk thread 1196628
That's the killer quote, and it shows up over and over in baleage threads. The pattern is consistent: people try twine first because it's cheaper at the baler, then switch to net wrap after their first winter of feed-out.
A Vermeer R2800 rake-shopping thread surfaced another quiet confirmation. The operator described his hay program like this:
"Baling dry grass hay for the most part but occasionally will do some higher moisture hay to wrap."
— OP, AgTalk thread 1217280
That's the typical XES customer for this article: dry hay most of the season, baleage occasionally. They want one inner-layer system that works for both crops. Net wrap is that system; twine isn't.
Five reasons net wrap is the better inner layer for baleage
1. Clean peel at feed-out
When you cut the stretch film off a baleage bale in January, you want what's underneath to peel away in one or two pieces — not three to six sisal strings buried in fermented forage.
Net wrap separates from the bale cleanly. Twine doesn't — it sinks into the surface as the bale settles, and you end up either fishing it out by hand or letting strings ride into the mixer (which is a separate, expensive problem — see our post on removing net wrap before grinding).
2. Better bale shape through the wait-to-wrap window
Most extension services (Penn State, Iowa Beef Center, NDSU, U of Kentucky Forage Extension) recommend wrapping baleage within 24 hours of baling, and as soon as possible after that. In practice, that window slips — rain, the wrapper is at the neighbor's, you ran out of film, the tractor is in the shop.
During that wait, a soft-shouldered or under-density bale will sag. A net-wrapped bale holds shoulder definition longer than a twine-wrapped one, which gives the film a more uniform surface to seal against and reduces "elephant foot" puddling at the bottom of the bale.
3. Less surface area exposed to air during the wait
Net wrap covers roughly the entire cylindrical surface plus a small amount of "edge cover" at the shoulders. Twine — even a tight wrap — covers maybe 5–10% of the surface. The rest is exposed hay.
For dry hay, that exposure doesn't matter much for a day or two. For baleage at 50–60% moisture in 85°F July weather, that exposed surface starts respiring (eating sugars, generating heat) the second the bale leaves the chamber. Every hour of pre-wrap heat is fermentation quality you don't get back.
4. Lower shatter loss when handling cold baleage in winter
When you grab a frozen baleage bale with a bale spear or grapple in January, the outer 1–2 inches of forage want to come off in chunks. Twine doesn't help hold those chunks on; net wrap does.
This shows up as visible leaf and stem litter on the feed pad and around the ring feeder. Iowa State Beef Center / Hay & Forage Grower reporting consistently puts feed-out waste for poorly-managed round bale storage at 5%–61% dry matter loss, with the better-managed end of that range correlated with covered/wrapped storage and tight surface integrity.
5. Works on softer crops where twine cuts in
Sorghum-sudan, cornstalks, and second-cut alfalfa are all "soft" relative to first-cut grass hay. Twine pulled tight on a soft crop can actually cut into the bale and create groove channels — perfect places for air to track in once you wrap with film. Net wrap distributes the holding force over the entire cylindrical surface and doesn't cut in the same way.
(The general "when twine still makes sense" cases — small-acreage dry hay only, indoor storage, a baler whose net-wrap unit isn't working yet — are covered in the main net wrap vs twine post. For baleage specifically, none of those cases really apply.)
What to pair it with
If you're running baleage, the inner layer is one of three decisions you're making together:
| Decision | Recommended for baleage |
|---|---|
| Inner layer | Net wrap (4-6 wraps on the cylinder, edge cover preferred) |
| Stretch film | 6-8 layers minimum (extension consensus; never under 4) |
| Wrap timing | Within 24 hours of baling; sooner if hot weather |
The XES net wrap line is DLG-certified, 680 lb tensile strength, and runs in every major brand of round baler (John Deere, Vermeer, New Holland, Case IH, Massey, Krone). Sizes available: 48", 51", 64", and 67" — see the net wrap sizes guide to figure out which fits your baler.
Bottom line
If you're paying for stretch film at $80–$110 a roll, you've already committed to the cost of doing baleage right. The inner layer is a $1–$2 per bale decision that determines how miserable next winter's feed-out is. Net wrap wins on every dimension that matters in the chute, in the field, in the yard, and at the bunk.
Twine costs less at the baler. Net wrap costs less by the time the bale hits the cow.
Daisy is the growth marketer at XES Bale Nets. She doesn't make hay herself, but she reads roughly a thousand AgTalk threads a quarter so the people who do can find clear answers faster. Every farmer quote in this post is a verbatim citation with a thread link — go read the originals.
Hero image: Wrapped silage bales — photo by Jean Barrow on Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
