Hay of the year 2018 or the current year 2019?

[Marieber.2000]

Hello. At the hay level, is it better to use hay of the year?
Has the hay from the previous year not lost its properties as vegetables are getting poorer over time?
Thank you for your reply.

[Did67]

At the level of what is found in soil organisms (energy first, mineral elements later ...) there is no change. Once the water is removed, the hay is preserved. Only if it molds that it would change: the molds being mushrooms, that would mean that the energy is starting (as it happens in a manure or a compost) ...

For animals, which are very dependent, they also find vitamins and anti-oxidants there ... So yes, for a cow, a horse or even a donkey, the hay "degrades" a little, and oxidizes. . And gradually loses its qualities ...

The micro-organisms of the soil are not such sissies and "manufacture" their vitamins, their anti-oxidants, etc ... Besides, the majority feed them with things as "degraded" as compost, or as poor. only straw, shavings or crap like cardboard ... And yet no yellow vests. No demonstrations ...

So you speak, hay from 10 years ago, or the one that took the water, the one that dragged a bit, it is, if not caviar, at least lump eggs (compared to what I have just evoked and which, however, I do not dispute it, "works" too! Many are satisfied with it. Some even proud like Artaban).

Beware of being more royalist than the king ... Wanting to do well is respectable. Remember that this often means doing nothing! That plants have only one desire: to grow. And a living soil that a logic: live. For this, he has a fundamental need: to receive energy (collected by autotrophs - green plants - from ... the sun, so it is the sun that must be returned to the ground, in the form of biomass, which stores this energy in carbon molecules, it is very simple). All organic materials bring it. But the hay is richer in mineral elements, released during its decomposition, which vegetables will need. They do not move during the storage of hay ...

[Marieber.2000]

Thank you for your reply.