Inline vs Traditional small Square Balers?

[jerry shannon]

After reading the posts I am not sure I want to get into hay. I have a 25 acre filed just planted with grass hay. I have 6 horses and am tired of buying market hay each year. I have an Oliver 1855 diesel but no hay equipment. I was thinking of a NH model 273 or 276. Not sure what mower or rake I should get. Can someone give me some guidence please? Do I want a rotrary rake, a tedder?

 

[AKfish]

After reading the posts I am not sure I want to get into hay. I have a 25 acre filed just planted with grass hay. I have 6 horses and am tired of buying market hay each year. I have an Oliver 1855 diesel but no hay equipment. I was thinking of a NH model 273 or 276. Not sure what mower or rake I should get. Can someone give me some guidence please? Do I want a rotrary rake, a tedder?

Quite a bit of the time... we already know what we want/need to do - we just need verification. I'm gonna guess that with 6 horses and a tractor - you've already got a pretty good picture of what/where/how and how much!

So, I'd like to ask you some questions.. maybe something that you haven't looked at in enough detail, yet. What kind of grass hay is the 25 acre field planted with? Pasture grasses are not (necessarily) the best hay (forage) material. Kentucky bluegrass varieties; for example. Excellent grazing, good regrowth, palatable, long-lived. Not a very good hay variety, though. Short, thin stemmed and becomes matted and difficult to mow and cure effectively prior to baling.

If you are able to harvest the 25 acre field for hay (good specie composition); do you have other grazing/pasture options while the field matures enough for a good hay crop?

Will you be able to harvest 2-3 cuttings per hay season? Do you have enough storage for all the hay?

How much annual precipitation do you normally get during a hay season? And how often does your area have adequate weather windows to prepare a hay crop? If the weather windows are short, irregular and oftentimes unreliable having a tedder and a MoCo (mower conditioner) can give you a 2 day edge on having a good crop or not.

Depending upon the type of hay - grass, alfalfa or a mix - the type of rake can be an advantage. If your hay is heavy, high leaf content and prone to twisting, roping or balling up; a wheel rake or rotary rake can be superior to a bar rake or side delivery rake - IMO. Wheel or rotary type can throw, fluff and better ventilate a heavy, leafy forage.

Do you have a good labor source? Small squares almost dictate that - hand labor. Your 1855 has enough Hp to work a good round baler as well as a good MoCo. And 6 horses will eat a round bale pretty fast!! With a feeder the waste can be manageable. Of course, handling a big bale requires some added equipment, too. Either a front loader for the 1855 or possibly a 3pt bale clamp.

AKfish

 

[CliffordK]

One cutting may still be sufficient.

Certainly you need to be able to arrange your property so that the hay field is not being grazed in the spring.

Part of it will also depend on whether you wish to purchase new equipment, or mess with used equipment, and how comfortable you are with repairing used equipment.

Around here, about 50% of the hay value goes to the land owner, 50% to the person mowing and baling.

It may cost as much as $3K to $5K to get someone in to cut and bale your 25 acres of hay. You would, of course, also save about $3K to $5K on purchasing the hay for the horses.

If you can pick up your haying equipment for less than $10K, you should be able to pay it off in a couple of years which is a very fast return on your investment. If you bale for neighbors, you would be able to pay it off much quicker.

If you invest $50K in your equipment, and only use it on your small farm, then undoubtedly it will break down before you get it paid off.

 

[bigbull338]

man if i had to pay 3 to 5k to get a 25ac meadow baled id buy my own equipment.we bale 150acs once a year as it usually makes 200 bales or more in a cutting.an our baling cost is close to 6gs a year.thats why we bought a big 5 by 6 baler.you need a disc cutter an 8 wheel rake with a sq baler.

 

[jerry shannon]

Thank you AKfish. Great information and questions. Here is some addittional information. I have 20 acres for our horses that is split for pasture rotation. We bought the property next door and have leases it out to a dairy farmer for $1.00 per year. In return we were supplied with our 600 bales of hay for the season. It worked ok but quality of hay is poor and the dairy farmer seems to thing that my Tennesee Walkers are goats and will eat whatever his cows eat. In Michigan last year due to drought, hay was scarce, so this spring he just planted what he said was "a grass horse hay". I do not know what it is. Our plan was to keep first cutting and he can have 2nd and 3rd cutting. We were just informed that he is done with the arrangement and we are going to do it ourselves. I do all the repair on my JD, Bobcat and Oliver so I can do most basic repair. As this is a new field I do not expect much out of it and will be buying hay for this coming fall when pasture is used up. Sorry I just rambled.

 

[jerry shannon]

Thank you CliffordK. At this point I am thinking "good used" equipment" if I can find it. Just torn on models and type of equipment. We use square bales as they are portioned control and less waste. We have a couple of hay hogs that if I put out a round bale would eat till they explode. In fact one of our Walkers, I don't think we have ever seen his head up off the ground. We call him trash can!! Lol

 

[jerry shannon]

I agree with your math! We didn't use hay as a cash crop jut feed foe our horses.. We only use first cutting and let the farmer have the other cuts for his cows. Our thinking has now changed and we are going to make the investment for a bailer, rake and bailer. I live in Michigan and weather is fickle. Do I also need a Tedder ?

 

[bigbull338]

ok you are going to make horse hay.id fert the 1st an 2nd cuttings.the 1st cutting really wont be horse quality hay.as your cleaning the field up from winter an spring.the 2nd cutting should be horse hay.you may want to spray the 2nd cutting for weeds.

 

[jerry shannon]

Iam 60 and my wife and I are the labor source. We have paid a couple of teens in the past to help stack bales in the barn but most of the time it's just me.

 

[jerry shannon]

We talked of that before but were told that first cut was better for the horses as it is not as rich. This was our horse vet talking. He has about 30 pacers so we listened to what he said. He is very old school however and the school of thought on what is best for a horse to reduce founder and colic is very broud. Due to drought this year in Michigan there was not much second cutting and zero third cutting. We were using anything we could get our hands on from our source.