Hay making help

cowboydoc · May 13, 2004

Egon anytime you want to come down for some hay cutting just let me know. Heck I'll even buy you a plane ticket. I'd like nothing better than to meet you and talk about the old days over a couple cold ones and a fresh cutting of hay.

Egon · May 14, 2004

Don't temp me Doc.

Egon

HayDR · May 14, 2004

Cowboydoc,
The USDA statistics show less than 30% of hay acreage is planted in alfalfa, This does not take into count hay harvested from pasture lands which I'd guess less than 20% is alfalfa. The majority of hay harvested is not alfalfa. Drum/Disc mowers and tedders are all any grass farmer needs to harvest their hay. Our 500 LBS calves brought $1.41 per pound last week, it sure is great to live in the USA.
Mark Carter

cowboydoc · May 14, 2004

I sure would like to tempt you Egon. If you ever need a vacation let me know.

CCI,

Hmm that's very interesting. Both in Iowa and home in Idaho I would say that figure is reversed. Most everyone I know has about 70% alfalfa and 30% grass. I guess that's why when I think hay I always think we're automatically talking about alflafa. Where we have grass it's mostly grazed and not baled much. Most horse people I know that do want to feed grass hay can't even find it because everyone has alfalfa. That must be a southern and eastern thing. Like I told another guy it's almost impossible to give advice on farming because the different regions of the country are so varied in their farming techniques. And I admit I don't know much about farming in the south and east.

I can see how you could do 300 acres if it's all grass. You're only going to do one or two cuttings. On most of our hay we do at least four cuttings and most years five. And when alfalfa is ready it all has to be cut. I would look into those new studies on cutting grass for hay though. I was very shocked at the nutrition values. It's no wonder now that I look back that our cows did so poorly on some grass hay that we've fed over the years. Basically it was just filler.

The other question I have Mark is how do you guys out east do 6.5 acres/hour? Even with our swathers and 14' cuts we can't do 6.5 acres/hour. I just don't see how you could go that fast on fields. They would have to be almost like glass to go that fast I would think. But I am learning about haying in your area so maybe it is different. I know the disc mower would have no trouble cutting the grass but how can you drive that fast? I did some calculations and according to my calculations with an 8' mower you would have to be going 12 mph to cut 6.5 acres in an hour. At best we can go 5-7 mph in hayfields.

Bird · May 14, 2004

( different regions of the country are so varied )

Yep, I would think greatly influenced by climate. In the area where I lived south of Dallas, I doubt that alfalfa is even 5% of hay grown. In fact, I only knew of one farmer who raised any alfalfa at all. It was nearly all grass (coastal or Johnson grass) or haygrazer, hybrid Sudan/sorghum mix. I assumed (whether right or wrong) that it was just too hot and dry for alfalfa.

And the only cutting I did personally was with a 9' haybine in grass hay at about 3.5 to 4 mph, so like you said, no way we were going to do 6 acres an hour.

carluman · May 14, 2004

So cowboydoc you trying to get your first cutting in? We just got rained on again this week and looks like we will be getting more. Dad had the cycle mower out this week and that alfalfa is ready to go.

Great info in this thread. I wanted to farm (just not bad enough I guess) but ended up in computer programming. I'm learning a little more now that I have Boer goats and starting to increase my heard size. Plus I'm about to my first tractor /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

HayDR · May 14, 2004

Cowboydoc,
 how do you guys out east do 6.5 acres/hour? Even with our swathers and 14' cuts we can't do 6.5 acres/hour. 
Maybe that green equipment is not as fast as the other guys. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif Pull the throttle back most farmers mow 6-10 mph with disc mowers and discbines. We put down 40 acres last week in 8 hours and our fields were not all in one location so we had some road time involved in that. We were using a 9' LELY disc mower and a 2355 John Deere tractor.

cowboydoc · May 14, 2004

Carl,

I am chomping at the bit to get into the fields. We have had rain almost everyday for the last two weeks. We're supposed to get a break this weekend but not enough time to get hay up. Pastures are belly high and need cut too. If I could just get four or five good days we'd be going 24 hours a day. Just can't get it.

Mark,

We have never been able to run 10mph. I still don't know how you do it. It's not a question of the mower keeping up it's just not possible to go that fast. You guys must have flat fields and plumb line level fields. On a side note what's the cost of those new mower conditioners that you guys have? The Vermeer ones.

Woodbeef · May 14, 2004

Just enough legumes for nitrogen fixation. Don't sell to milkers,so do not need above 12% or so protein on average.

slowzuki · May 14, 2004

Good discusion about different haying around. In my area there is very little alfalfa, I know I used to dread the fields that were as the bales weight went way up!

Many horse people here feed alf-alfa when they shouldn't so my sister says. They even pay extra to get it!

Re mowing speeds, I'm thinking more like 2 or 3 acres an hour cut, limited by tractor speed and hitting rocks with the haybine.

We are going to try a tray to towed wagon this year, we always used to drop on the ground and load the wagon. I'm hoping this will cut the crew to two stackers, free up a tractor and we can leave everyone else at teh barn unloading.