2-3-2012- hay tractorcam

        no i wasn't yelling at you or i would have said hey you.  i was talking about hay to feed cattle with. farming as far as i am concerned is a lot about making hay. almost every beef farmer has a hay story. whether it was the time you baled the snake in the square bale and threw it to clarence , who was scared of snakes and had a bad heart to begin with who suddenly grew an extra set of feet and scooted right of the barn , leaving us all laughing. he said he didnt have time to have heart trouble as he was to scared from snake. it isnt in a farmers interest to bale snakes as they do eat small rodents and such as they do. farmers usually understand better than most that all things have a purpose , and usually give fair leeway to animals . at least i do. it isn't necessary for me to hunt and i like seeing the wild animals myself. groundhogs i discourage as their holes will upset tractors and try to fill their holes in . hopeing they get the idea and head to the edge of the field. well it isnt sunshine and warm and a lot of these pics are from when i was still smoking in june of 2009 and i quit in dec. of 2009. i haven't smoked since and i am glad to have that monkey off my back. but seeing the cigs reminds me of those days. 

       i started riding wagons when i was 4 years old as it usually took everyone to make hay in the old days. at times we would have 5 or six and up to 10 people at a time making hay and emptying wagons into the barn. now it can be done with one person and one tractor and a few other specialized pieces of equipment. this pic above is from my tractor cam (isnt it amazing how far technology has come.actually it is a camera in my hand on outstretched arm).this is a mower conditioner that uses a sickle bar knife to slice the hay under that wheel where it is pulled from the machine by rollers that bend the hay at intervals to decrease drying time. although this is straw from oats i planted as a cover crop and are fairly dry it helps put bends in the hay and lift it up off ground which also helps with the drying. the second pic is as it looks after mowing 

       this procedure used to be accomplished by 2 different machines , and usually 2 different tractors , so this one machine is a big labor saver, now the technology has changed and machines are larger and supposed quality of the hay is better. sorry but the tractor cam was at wrong angle and had to include me on some pictures. this is a rake in the above pic. it looks like i am raking green hay but the hay is drying and it is also second cutting and is more tender and green and needs to be preserved that way. weather is so important at this stage as one rain essentially ruins a crop of hay diminishing its quality by 50 percent. the idea of the rake is to take a 10 foot swath of hay and roll it across ground as softly as possible making what we call windrows.   

      it is at this point i must describe the smells emanating from a hayfield at this point as the sun comes up and it starts heating up the air causing the wind to stir through the windrows and the smell of hay becomes something that is like baled summer. it overwhelms the field the farm and our little corner of the planet as it is so sweet as dried flowers blossoms sweet clover alfalfa , timothy and orchard grass slow bake in the sun. this will last as long as it takes to bale and then shortly afterward. the warm summer breezes wafting these wonderful scents into the air. in the pic above is the top field of oats that has been cut and the bottom field is hay and are both drying. drying continues till hay is almost completely dry. raking is postponed until right before baling , as it is easier to dry flat hay then when it is raked up into windrows. but raking is necessary to dry the bottomside of the flat hay

     baling is a lot different than it used to be . at first we started off with a round baler making little round bales 40 -60 lbs. . they were awkward and loose and it seemed as the only benefit you had with them was you could leave in the field to dry . we would stand them up against each other and when dried would come out and pick up. again it took a crew of people to operate the round baler. one on each side and a third to follow along and bark orders, while another drove the tractor. it wasn't a pretty job following the baler. then we bought us a square baler . our first one was used and slightly broken and soon broke worse after a steel post went through it and messed the timing up and it broke both the tieing needles. we finally got this baler fixed but it had other issues and the next time we bought a new holland 273 square baler. and it had a bale kicker . i was in heaven . no more stacking wagons. not hardly. and now i have a 863 new holland large round baler capable of making 1000 lb. bales . 

     so now we have went from having a bunch of help and carrying hay to the barn on wagons, then having automatic stacking and now large round bales we just leave in the field till we need it. one person can cut , condition , and bale by himself where it used to take a crew to do. the baler is located behind me as tractor cam failed to pic out a good angle to fully show baling operation . this baler basically rolls the dried wind rowed hay up into large round bales and ties it with an organic biodegradable string that holds the bale together to take to feeding area. whats left of string is removed from bales prior to feeding. 

         after the field is baled then you still have to move to feeding area with tractor. above picture is the fields i had baled that day. the bales are then picked up by the tractor one on front and one on back , to counter the weight, and taken to the feeding staging area. this all takes place over about 3 days total from time it is cut till it is finally baled and moved. you can click on smaller images to enlarge.