The Farm. Haying and Cattle Thread

[paul]

I took the gamble and cut my swamp ground hay 2 days ago, second cutting. There was a 20-30% chance of light rain shower today at that time.

So, this noon we got .9 inch of rain. Some of the hay is in water.

So it goes. Can’t bale it if I don’t cut it, can’t wait until December for a dry forecast….

Paul

 

[flying belgian]

I took the gamble and cut my swamp ground hay 2 days ago, second cutting. There was a 20-30% chance of light rain shower today at that time.

So, this noon we got .9 inch of rain. Some of the hay is in water.

So it goes. Can’t bale it if I don’t cut it, can’t wait until December for a dry forecast….

Paul

I hear you Paul. I cut alfalfa yesterday thinking 30% odds is worth the risk. WRONG!

 

[INCase]

thanks for all the pictures. that part of the country is hard to get hay dry. lots of cloud cover and heavy soil (in places) that doesn't dry well. Dad's family is from Mercer area and I (we) went to school at Youngstown State. One class there we were looking at the amount of sunlight calculations for different parts of the country for doing solar energy calculations (back in the 80's BEFORE solar was getting popular) and it turns out Youngstown technically has less sunshine than Seattle Washington. This is also why they built munitions plants in the area during the war. natural cloud cover to hide things.

Do you use Elders' for you Deere parts? My uncle used to go there for his Olivers back in the day. They sold both lines back then. I have a few JD tractor and combine brochures from there when i was a kid. unfortunately not much of our family still lives in Mercer county (including myself) . Over 200 years in Coolspring township plus much longer in Mercer county and even longer in Pennsylvania.

 

[deere4040]

thanks for all the pictures. that part of the country is hard to get hay dry. lots of cloud cover and heavy soil (in places) that doesn't dry well. Dad's family is from Mercer area and I (we) went to school at Youngstown State. One class there we were looking at the amount of sunlight calculations for different parts of the country for doing solar energy calculations (back in the 80's BEFORE solar was getting popular) and it turns out Youngstown technically has less sunshine than Seattle Washington. This is also why they built munitions plants in the area during the war. natural cloud cover to hide things.

Do you use Elders' for you Deere parts? My uncle used to go there for his Olivers back in the day. They sold both lines back then. I have a few JD tractor and combine brochures from there when i was a kid. unfortunately not much of our family still lives in Mercer county (including myself) . Over 200 years in Coolspring township plus much longer in Mercer county and even longer in Pennsylvania.

Zahm & Matson and Gallup & Tenhaken now Landpro are my 2 JD dealers. All my dealers are NY as they are closer. It can be difficult but then there are times when drying hay is to easy. I actually prefer Oct/Nov hay making over July/Aug. Just a different mentality.

Copy and paste from another forum.

This past week I pulled off a couple firsts that I was not expecting. Making hay in November is not a first as we did it in 2021 and try to make it a regular event just because nobody does it and a lot of people say it can't be done. I find November hay to be some of the easiest and greenest hay to make but you have to be patient. This year's was no exception. It started with mowing and tedding in the snow on Wednesday. The goal was to get a couple freeze drying events to assist in the drying of the hay. We never really got those. Low temps were low 30's. The plan was Sunday to make a decision whether to attempt dry or make baleage. Friday at 830 in the morning tedding it for the 2nd time and the dust was coming off from it. 1030 I was raking and 1pm we started baling. If you had told me I was going to make dry hay in 2 days in November I would say your crazy but everything came together in an unusual way.

 

[deere4040]

Finally done with our 1st cutting. 130 acres of 2nd and and 3rd on deck when weather cooperates and a custom job of 1st cutting left to do.

 

[deere4040]

The cattle's natural fly control

Started green chopping the corn.

 

[deere4040]

Late evening dirt work. Preparing for rye tomorrow.

Rye planted. Spoiled this year. No bags, buying from my cousin so got to use the seed tender. I'll say it fills the drill in minutes but reality is a minute and some and that is not even full speed. Darn quick.

Last of the first is down. Custom job of round bales.

And a field of 3rd cutting down. Estimating 40 bales/acre for customer scheduling but expecting it to go on the high side of 50 bales/acre

 

[deere4040]

After effect of chiseling. The rocks. Let the tractor drive itself. Walk the field scan for discrepancies, not the way we used to do it. Growing up it was a 4 man crew

 

[deere4040]

Officially done with 1st. 80 bales of custom. Nothing but hill makes the baling a little slower.

2nd for my uncle then we did my 3rd. No pictures of mine.

My estimate on my 3rd cutting was off. Ended up going 41.8 bales/acre. Not pushing the 60 bale mark.

 

[paul]

I’m hoping to make a small second cutting end of this week. See what the weather does. Part of it will be 3rd cutting, bested stuff would be second cutting.

Looks like you had good weather, good stuff there.

Paul

 

[Dick L]

Been a long couple days with straw and hay. Straw yielded good at 1400 bales but very unhappy with the bales. The crop was inconsistent resulting in loose bales. 50% of the bales I would say were perfect and 90% of the bales had good weight but by the time they were handled by 3-4 people they were looking rough. An inline baler would resolve one of the issues. Always kicked myself for not getting one when bought new even knowing they were recommended for the accumulator. Creates headaches every year.

Bit off more than I could chew on the hay. Sunday had a really nice 3 day window knowing late in the day on Tuesday Thunderstorms were predicted. Took the gamble and knocked down the 20 acres. Not a hard run. Ran the numbers we already had and inflated them knowing they are our better fields. Lined up customers for approx 1100 bales and rest would fit on the wagons. Running the model runs on Monday it wasn't looking to promising. Intialized June 8th at 2pm, while the simulated radar doesn't show lots of rain what it does tell me is the cloud cover is high. Couple that with high cape values it was not a promising outlook.
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Well everything that came through somehow missed our fields. Would like to say it is my forecasting skills but really it was just dumb luck. Finally got going at 1pm Tuesday. One of the Amish drivers canceled so lost about 300 bales that were going to leave on this round. Yields went much higher than anticipated. 9 acres went 107 bales/acre. The other field went approx 90. Finished up with baling 1542 bales and still have 5 acres on the ground. Not sure I can get lucky 2 days in a row. Rain chances this morning then clearing. Will be round baling the rest if possible.


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Some pictures of past couple days.

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I loved your pictures. Thanks for taking the time to share. Your square bale collection equipment is the same as my neighbor uses when he bales my hay. They use a skid steer to set a stack of 20 bales at a time on my wagon and at my horse barn door.

 

[deere4040]

Forgot I did some custom straw baling a few weeks ago. First time baling behind a merger. For the straw it worked good. Lumpy so have my doubts it would work good on dry hay but maybe. The baler that usually does it has been down and the guy that was baling before I got to the field had a baler missing more teeth than a local resident. That was saying something. Uncle was stressed. I've had 2 other calls from my cousin and was doing my own. This time I was available and we were racing rain. If the other guy had stayed I could have lapped him so many times. He was barely at a crawling pace.

 

[paul]

It has decided to be very humid, 85-90 degree temps, and rain dribbles every 36 hours for the past 3 days and future 3-4 days.

See what 10 days from now is like for more hay cutting.

I’ve had enough of this weather this summer. Others around me are so short on water, and I’m complaining about it. Just how it has gone around here. I had 3/4 inch a few days ago, in town 5 miles away they got a tenth or so….

Paul

 

[ss55]

It has decided to be very humid, 85-90 degree temps, and rain dribbles every 36 hours for the past 3 days and future 3-4 days.

See what 10 days from now is like for more hay cutting.

I’ve had enough of this weather this summer. Others around me are so short on water, and I’m complaining about it. Just how it has gone around here. I had 3/4 inch a few days ago, in town 5 miles away they got a tenth or so….

Paul

That kind of weather hurts those with hay on the ground, but really helps the soybean and corn crops fill out.

 

[paul]

Yea I can’t complain really, hay is a hobby, corn and soybeans are supposed to pay the bills, so it’s been a good summer here.

But too humid for me! Ha ha.

Paul

 

[deere4040]

50 acres of 2nd on the ground. Hard drizzle for some of it while mowing and tedding.

 

[flying belgian]

50 acres of 2nd on the ground. Hard drizzle for some of it while mowing and tedding.

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I’ve never used a tedder but what is the gain in doing it in a hard drizzle?

 

[deere4040]

I’ve never used a tedder but what is the gain in doing it in a hard drizzle?

It's down and drying. Weather was sun, clouds, passing rain possible all day in to the night. If you look at percentage which I don't it was ranged from 25-80% chance. When looking at total accumulation over the 20 hour period that chances were possible it was negligible. I'm a day ahead in drying as opposed to starting on Saturday. On a cloudy drizzly day one would think it doesn't dry but you would be surprised how drying happens in those types of conditions. Couple peaks of sun and a steady breeze just sucks the moisture out of the hay. Windows are small and when you cover almost 200 acres per cutting of dry hay you have to be aggressive and think outside the box.

 

[deere4040]

50 acres of 2nd on the ground. Hard drizzle for some of it while mowing and tedding.

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Field went 38 bales/acre. 1356 squares and 30 4x4's. Only 3 rounds and couple hundred bales made it in the barn. Everything else went down the road.

Our view when sitting after a hard days work.

 

[flying belgian]

I like nice things and it looks like you do too.