Hay Pics from "08

[bake321]

Hay Man,

 

[bake321]

Hay Man,

OOPs, Lets try this again keeping a closer watch on fat fingers. Great pics. Your pasture looks good. I bucked a lot of bales in the summer time growing up in Michigan. This year I will be baling hay for myself. I'm retiring in March and not being one to just sit around I decided to grow some hay and raise some beef. I bought a farm in south central Kentucky, 122 acres, with 70 acres in pasture. I have 10 head of Simmental on it now and want to get up to 20/30. I've got a good tractor, but need to round up the haying equipment.

Bake

 

[Hoosier Hay Man]

It must have been the 488 I was looking at when i was at the dealer then. Sharp looking machines, I hope that when my 479 breaks down that I'll be able to find parts for it. The rollers are shot now and I don't think it would be worth it to replace them. But then again, I haven稚 priced them out so I'm not sure what it would cost.

Parts availiblibility for your 479 should be no problem. They are still building the 488 which is the same machine basically. I haven't looked close enough between the two to see what minor differences there are. I was on NH website and couldn't find the 1465 which is the newer version of the 489. Maybe they discontinued it. The 489/492/1465 has the independent floating head as where the 479/488 the whole machine floats. Both do a good job.

Rollers were over $1,000 apeice a few years ago. I am sure they are more now.

How much hay do you do?

 

[funny farmer]

I'm cutting around 60 acres now, this will be my 4th year baling for myself. It seems like every year I pick up 20 additional acres, I have some neighbors that have a few fields, one's all grown in with small saplings, I was thinking of asking them if I could hay it but it would take me a couple years to get those fields in good condition, we'll see how busy I am this spring. The 20 that I picked up last summer hasn't been cut in 8 yrs, and hasn't been worked up at least 17 years. So I took a couple days this fall and got it plowed up, with a 2 bottom plow, and I'm going to plant clover, timothy, and use oats for a cover crop. And the rest of the fields need a really good dose of fertilizer, hopefully I can afford it this year. Last summer I made 280 4x4 rounds and 250 small squares off of the 60 acres. I hope to be able to at least triple that number in the next two years. Looking at those pictures brings me a warm fuzzy feeling, but then I forget about the heat, sweat, exhaust in my face all day.

 

[flusher]

Mighty nice haying equipment. I imagine that you and your crew can handle 34 acres lickity split with those excellent mocos and balers.

Do you need to use that Kuhn tedder/rake or can you bale the windrows that the mocos produce without more tedding/raking?

Noticed that you stack the small squares on the hay wagon. Great cardiovascular workout. But have you thought about some sort of bale accumulator/grapple setup? If so, which type would you buy?

Any idea of the tons/acre you're getting?

 

[Robert_in_NY]

How evenly do your fields dry down? On my narrow tree lined fields I have to plan for an extra day of drying time as the trees keep the field shaded longer and limit air flow. On my larger open fields I just bale the tree line last to give it a tad more time to dry down. The shade holds the dew longer causing me my problems but luckily most of my fields are in the open and I only have three areas I have to contend with.

Nice pics by the way.

 

[Hoosier Hay Man]

Mighty nice haying equipment. I imagine that you and your crew can handle 34 acres lickity split with those excellent mocos and balers. Do you need to use that Kuhn tedder/rake or can you bale the windrows that the mocos produce without more tedding/raking?
Noticed that you stack the small squares on the hay wagon. Great cardiovascular workout. But have you thought about some sort of bale accumulator/grapple setup? If so, which type would you buy?

Any idea of the tons/acre you're getting?

When it is part time and it is just me and the wife I found out you need some nice size equipment to get it done in hurry. We rarely get more than a 3-4 day window of dry weather to make hay so speed is important. I do bale wheat straw and around another 10 acres alfalfa custom.

In Indiana with the humidity and limited dry spells you almost always need to both ted and rake. Sometimes we have to rake a second time. First and second cutting definitly, third and fourth usally just rake. Most around here use a preservitive so they bale upto 20% to 25% moisture.

I have looked at Kuhns Accumilator built in Ohio. It is by far the simplest design.


I get between 3 to 5 tons an acre.

 

[Hoosier Hay Man]

Hi Bake,

Sounds like you have a sound plan there. I worked on a farm when I was in school that had a Simmental bull. He was a bit spoiled as they showed him at one time. He would want to play when you were in or near his lot. Always wanted to have an exit plan with him around. I do love cattle though. We have some Saanen dairy goats as well. We are going to try some intense grazing this spring. We have been building fence all fall. Here are a couple of pics.

My fatherinlaws 970 Case with Allis-Chalmers forklift mast used to unload fence post off a friends AutoCar semi tractor trailer. There is a 7000 Allis in the background pounding post in.

We put in 3 frost free faucets.

Bake, Keep us updated on your Kentucky Farm. Good Luck!!! It sure us beutiful down there.

 

[Hoosier Hay Man]

Hi funny farmer,

Sounds like you are growing into quite the operation. Wow! I would love to have 60 acres of hay!
You are doing it the right way by picking up ground inexpensively. It is tough to find ground that way around here. It has all been plowed into corn or beans. Cash rents $200 an acre, some more. I think that is starting to cool off a bit.

Keep us updated on seeding with clover, timothy, and using oats for a cover. I have good luck using oats, oats make pretty good hay also.

 

[Hoosier Hay Man]

How evenly do your fields dry down? On my narrow tree lined fields I have to plan for an extra day of drying time as the trees keep the field shaded longer and limit air flow. On my larger open fields I just bale the tree line last to give it a tad more time to dry down. The shade holds the dew longer causing me my problems but luckily most of my fields are in the open and I only have three areas I have to contend with.
QUOTE]

Hi Robert,

The tree lines do add sometime to drying. Sometimes I bale the tree lines in the middle of the day when I am getting leaf shatter in the center of the field. That is one advantage of being on the wagon loading you can tell what is going on with the moisture since I don't have a moisture moniter on my baler. I use hand signals to have my wife change course in the field if it to dry or to tough. When she lets out on the clutch too fast she never looks back for that hand signal!