Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Making Hay....early

My boy wants to know what you're running for a tractor?

How fast are you running, 5-6mph?

Even with light hay, that's a pretty nice baler to eat that up at that speed.

'77 1086 International. I gave 5000 bucks for it years ago.

I was running 10 or so in that video.

That one smooth-ass field. Gotta love round bailers, there's no slowing down for the packer to catch up.


Did you kill the fücking bird who shît all over your hood?

What's the hp of a 1086?

130 ish PTO

Ha! Kinda.

When I first go going the other day I noticed a loss of power and my air cleaner light would come on pulling the hill headed south.

I took the hood off to blow out the cleaner and found a nest in the air cleaner. Damned starling had flown up the air inlet pipe and made a fine nest for herself. I had to disassemble the grille and some baffles to to get the nest out.

Had a couple dead chicks in it, so at least I killed some of them.

i hate starlings. only redeeming thing about them is they afford some fair pass shooting.
we are cutting timothy now between rain storms. seems like one day sun one day rain.

They raise some timothy in the valley. Never been around it. Do you feed that to cattle or is timothy horse hay?

In PA we grow Timothy and Clover for cattle feed.

I bet timothy and clover makes a fine ration.

What kind of clover?

Around here timothy is the preferred horse hay. I have some timothy in all my pastures/hay fields. Makes nice hay but doesn't seem to regrow real well.

I just finished hauling in bales off the field around our house today. ent out to finish hauling bales in and the dang tractor wouldn't start. Luckily the boss hadn't left yet so I had her pull start me. Got the rest of the bales in and stacked. Then I "repaired" some gated pipe to get water on that field late this evening.

I hate hauling bales. My loader tractor is old and a bit fragile. I am sitting there in the tractor constantly waiting for the dang thing to break down, as it did today. Have a guy coming to pull the starter, hoping to get it into the shop and repaired tomorrow.

The oldsters fed Timothy to their hosses and mules around here in the old days. Nobody raises it anymore. There is still some growing down in my pastures though. Here and there. My family had two 1086's. First one bought brand-new out of Miami, Oklahoma. Remember when they delivered it. Awesome tractor in 1977. My cousin later bought a used one...I think it was an '80 or '81 model.

You sure are going faster than I do. Of course, I live in the area between the Plains and the Ozarks and I don't have one meadow that's not up and down.

Thanks for the video. It sure is a different scale than on a small family farm back east.

Nice setup, Ethan!

Jim, I'd wreck the tractor and baler doing 10mph here.

Too much hog damage. About the fastest I care to run doing anything in a pasture or field is about 4.5mph.

They grow a LOT of hay here. There's about 1/2 million dairy cows here plus a lot of beef stock. For some reason, we seldom see round bales. Big bales are much more common, usually stacked about 4 high on the west sides of lots for windbreaks until its fed.

There are two issues with round bales that come into play around here. One, they don't transport easily, because the dimensions are awkward for a semi-trailer.

Second, especially around here, the humidity is only high enough for a few hours a day so that the hay doesn't crumble to dust going through the baler. A round baler, at least the ones I've been around, need to stop and tie off the strings once the bale is completed. Then you eject the bale, and start a new one.

The square balers are more expensive, but you can keep running when a bale is completed and being tied off. When fighting time, that makes a substantial difference, at least 50% more throughput. It can be the difference between green hay and brown hay, as well. Combine that with the easy of transport, the square bales win.

Most of the round bales here are wrapped now, instead of tied.

The transport of round bales here is mostly local too. Usually the guy selling the hay offers a delivery price and a pick up price.

I pick mine up. There's a distance from the ranch where loads exceeding weight and width are exempted from DOT rules. I believe it's 125 mile radius. Not that I'd care to take a long road trip with a load like the one below... Hay and trailer weight exceeded 30,000 pounds per load.

Thanks. Mine is old-school without a computer and with string instead of wrap. After seeing that video it's obvious I need to trade my baler for a netwrap with a monitor.

We went from round bales to 3X4 squares - mostly due to space needed in the hay barns.

It's nice to be able to bale grass during daylight hours. I have to bale my alfalfa when the dew comes in to keep the leaves. It makes for long days.

Amazing how fast you can go baling. Nice job!

And short nights!

The net wrap is really nice. It used to take me about 45-50 seconds with twine. With net wrap it takes less than 20 seconds to wrap.

Net is more expensive, but you save it on time and fuel.

Not many big squares around here. None of it is stacked inside.

Folks have found that round bales keep better outside than big squares, especially if you are going to carry over some hay.

Most people here try to have some carry over.

We used to bale at night since we never get a dew in the mornings. Now we cut one day and bale it the next. We keep the rake a couple hours ahead of the baler so that the fluffed up windrows dry a bit more.

Nuthin' better'n that older IH iron... Solid built - honest HP... Knew it was an IH as soon as I saw that hood, just didn't know the size..

Nice video... beautiful country!!

past 2nd cutting down here.

Of course the corn is past the roasting ear stage already too... seems like we had black silk around memorial day just south of us.

Jim, that really is beautiful country and I love haying big fields like that!


Driest spring here in +100 years, just unbelievable. Plenty of wind though, seems like it blows everyday. Blowing 40-50mph right now so I said the hell with it and called it a day.


That wrap sure is nice for making a quick bale, I don't miss waiting for twine one bit! We have a pair of NH 7090's and don't rake anything. You can really put up the hay in a timely fashion when they are both running. Short window for dew around here and it burns of quick.

What wrap do you use?

We use Bridon Integra and it's okay but not as strong the Vermeer brand. No big deal most of the time but it'll rip pretty easy when the damn ice comes around. Good for alfalfa bales because they tend to stay together a lot better than hay barley or straw.

Round bales just work better for us as well. Easy to feed with the pickup and like you say they carryover better. Like you guys we are looking to put up 1000 ton but I'm sure we'll have to buy some as well. Our dryland hay barley is in dismal shape and I doubt we'll even cut it. Hell half of it didn't even come up. Layin' in dry ground for the last 45 days....



But we got everything watered on the riverbottom and I've been cutting a hellacious 1st cutting of alfalfa. It should average 2-3 ton/acre.


Stressing out dodgin' fawns and birds....

Blowing hard here too Sam. We never went to the field, thought about it a couple times and decided not too. This light hay would blow today, and if we got a fire going it might be in Wolf Point tonight.

We dont get a dew up here, about 10 miles south of the valley. We have to bale with some stem moisture. Sometimes a bit too much stem moisture!

We used the big rolls of John Deere wrap for a couple years. It was okay, but would have some trouble with damn near each roll. They were too heavy for anyone else but me...around 9000 feet.

Last year we switched to the Bridon stuff and really like it. Never have any trouble with it. Quite a bit lighter. We put on 2.2 wraps per the monitor.


I still use twine for straw and grain hay so they dont explode when frozen.

I am glad you are going to get a good first cutting. Most of the folks around here say their first will be poor. Some of them sprayed for weevils when they probably should have just gone ahead and cut it.


We have some organic wheat that looks okay. The lentils look okay too.

The safflower and conventional wheat are wrecks. Pretty much anything we seeded after the 15 of May is garbage.

We seeded into moisture but with wind every day it dried out past the seed. Only half a stand.

If we get some rain later we might work it up and plant millet or sorghum-sudan grass and try to sell it for hay.


Good looking fawn. I bet he was in the next swath over on the next round.

Too many seagulls though.......

Jim, thanks for the info, just about the same deal here.


Things are so far gone that even if it did rain it's too late.


We have bare dirt all over the place out in the hills. No grain sprouted, hell the damn weeds didn't even spout after the pre-spray....


I wish you guys the best of luck.


At least the cattle market is holding steady(for now...).


And if you have any wheat in the bin spring wheat is at the highest price in 2 years.

The weather's been to wet to make dry hay here. We've been wrapping everything. Chipping away at our dryer fields in between showers.

Few loads tonight.

Nothing like a good ol binder. I run a 1586 for plowing and cutting tractor. Square bale with a Case 2290. Backup tractor is a John Deere 4020. Just finished round baking part of my coastal. 95 bales on 25 acres. Sudan made 124 on 32acres. We've had a fair year for rain finally. Thanks for the video. I enjoy seeing how other people farm. Always good to see a good ol international still being used.

Jeezus, what a cool video. Damn, that's a lotta flat field, all connected. Very nice.

The good old days...

That's a lot of bales to move. My neighbor's putting up small square straw bales. His brother has a contract with every Walmart in a seventy-five mile radius as well as a big farm store chain. I guess they make pretty good money off them. I never made anything off small squares. I still have my square baler out in the barn. I haven't used it in probably twenty years.

Is it weird if I look at that video and just wonder how I would have to adjust my hunting style if I lived out there? Put enough hay away as a youngster usually the one at the top of the mow getting all the dust from each bale coming off the elevator and working near the roof where it's a stifling 100 degrees with no air moving on a good day, that anything hay related makes me intentionally think of other things as an automatic defense mechanism to forget the torture. Lol.

Red clover, just got in—another long day.

I drool with lust when I see alla them round bales!

My cousin is a lot bigger farmer than me. I had to go over there today and I was telling him and my Uncle about this video. The old 1086 was right outside the shed, broke down. Cuz says too much money to fix. Over $3000 just for tires. The sheet metal looks better than yours, but about everything else is done for. Just wore out.

He's got a nearly new John Deere (Kuhn) Disc Mower sitting in the shed. I pointed out his old disc mower laying in two pieces outside, to my son and said, "I got our disc mower a year after he got that one,". Jeff was amazed. Then later I realized that wasn't even the mower, it was the one he traded the original disc mower that was a year older than mine, off for." So it was a lot newer than mine. Mine is a New Idea, a company that got bought by Fiat and had their disc mowers re-branded Hesston. Cuz' second mower didn't last nearly as long as the first. I think mine is a '96. I think my baler must be a 2005.

That's a whole lotta hay.... Wouldn't be much fun to little square bale...grin

Relative pikers.

We bale enough small squares to keep for horses, and sick cattle - when the conditions permit - just a few hundred, usually.
If we get a heavy crop - we'll bale quite a few for horse folks. (Alfalfa / brome mix)

If we still ran the cows here instead of leasing, and we still did small squares.... I'd be in better shape bucking bales.

Although ours were not all that heavy.

In a drought we got two 18 wheelers of alfalfa... about damn near killed a buddy and I....

Of course we rarely put away more than 1000 to 1200 of the small ones... but it kept you a bit better in shape.....

And then there was my buddy Tim from WI..... he could knock you off the trailer with a bale.... I think he was the smallest kid of the family.. 7 foot and 350 and skinny... well maybe not quite but you get the drift....wish I knew where he was these days.

Just for you JC!

If they's seagulls why in heck does same have 'em in his fields?

SamO, you holding out on us? You got a ocean up there in MT we don't know about?

Geno

PS, sorry guys, it's my edumacation coming out. We were "trained" that they are "gulls", not "seagulls" My wife also, and when we're traveling and see them in a town like Reno or someplace far inland we always look at each other and say there must be an ocean somewhere.

Sam........ and others,

thanks for sharing the work you do.

And thanks for helping to feed us.

Sam, I bet some of these folks around here are doing alright. Saw a barge at the elevators downriver Saturday filling up with 4000 ton, and two more 3K-3.5K barges at the one across the river today. I bet the farmers around here are emptying the Butler bins as fast as they can.

Geno

You mean you work?

I thought you just were a funny guy on here

Geno

Haha! Thanks Sam.....to say I am honored.......

Always amazed at the speed today's swathers can do.

Wife says you got a nice....er, uh, hay field!

When did I sign into Farmersonly.com?😜

Hey Jim,

you missed a spot. about the 2:27 mark

Not really, you know I'm a joker.

That's pretty cool stuff there, I bet half or better of the American public has no idea how much time, effort, sweat etc goes into their McDonald's burger and fries. I've been across the country a few times and seen a lot of farmland, yet I was still amazed at how much wheat they grow over here on the Palouse. And this is just E WA. Watching those barges fill up and go down to Potland then back up, over and over and over. That big 4 Shaver barge at 4k tonnes is something else, 8 million pounds of wheat in one barge. Almost crazy, that's a bunch of burger buns for sure.

You farmers are great,

Maybe a bit overpaid and underworked.......... like us .gov workers!

enjoy your evening all you farmers, I know you'll be back at it again in the morning............. if not for a good chunk of the night.

Geno

Geno, those damn gulls are absolutely hell on the mice and anything else than can swallow.

When the pheasant chicks hatch I carry a shotgun in the cab....

And no chicks yet which is weird. Drove over a couple nests but the eggs were fresh and appeared to be a ways away from making chicks.



Jim, you've officially made it in life...


grin


This relentless wind will drive a guy to drinkin'!



1minute, I always cut a little slower just in hopes that the critters have time to get out of the way. But the new disc or rotary headers can really go I guess.

I'm like an onion.

Sam,

Gulls are tremendous predators/scavengers/jacks of all trades. Smarter than usually given credit for too. I've seen things at hatcheries I worked at that were pretty amazing.

Haven't seen any peasant chicks here yet either. And relatively few quail peeps too. Starting to get a bit worried that we won't have much to hunt. Saw one set of quail with their 10 or so chicks last week, saw another with only 4 chicks jut the other day, think something's been eating little quail!

I'm guessing the first broods failed and hoping they get a decent second one. I'm planning on coming back up from the retirement place for the bird season and maybe do some salmon fishing too.

Geno

PS, I've not heard anything about shotguns in the tractor if anyone asks

Really now?

Stinky and make people cry?

Geno

PS, how much rain needed for that red clover? I've got a small pasture at the retirement place. I may want to put a goat or three on there or maybe a coupla sheep. Thinking I'd vary the mix of grasses with something like clover.

I saw a couple of huns the other day with what looked like 10 chicks or so.

Few sharpies or pheasants.

Bloody damn seagulls. Er, gulls I guess. Bloody damn gulls.

Nah, I think I will still call them seagulls.......

Jim, do you think the drought is gonna be a bad(as in BAD) deal for upland birds and their chicks?

This chit is a first for me, never seen anything like it in my life.


Oh yeah, more hay vids bro!





Great haying weather, 90F and the ever constant breeze again today.




Stick a fork in this country, she's done.

What hay are you fellas making?

Alfalfa, grass, prairie grass?

Bender, Jim was baling dryland prairie grass that might have had alfalfa in it. Curious myself about the combo.

It can make great feed. Works good for cows especially if you throw in a little barley cake and/or lick tubs.



We were baling flood irrigated alfalfa that should have been watered earlier. A sandy section of the field stunted out and didn't do well.

Super fine stemmed and the cows will love it but low tonnage and can make for a mess when you go to roll one out with the pickup.

Thisn's fer Sam!

The field I was bailing used to be farming. We planted it to hay about 6 years ago.

It has about 4 pounds of alfalfa in it with a bunch of different wheat grasses. slender, pubescent, western and a few others.

Basically it was like a standard CRP mix.

That is fricken awesome....grin


Your country looks GOOD compared to the burned up stuff around here.....



Fine lookin' little man even if he is saving his voice....



The old story/warning goes never let a little guy lean on the windows, especially the front one.....

Glad to see your boy hanging on the handle!

I should have gotten him a little chair or something. He did not ride too long though.



We got a couple tenths the other day Sam, saved it from going completely brown. Still did not bring up the late crops though. My buddy south of Malta got a couple hundredth's.


As far as the birds go, I dont know.

I always thought that the cold and rain was way harder on them than the dry. But this dry is hard on everything, so I guess its gonna be tough on them too.

I did see a bunch of pheasant chicks right before I started whistling today.

Been seeing some Huns, all sizes. Little chicks all the way up to little flyers. Not sure what would have caused that. Maybe it was the late frosts and the cold spring.

I gotta say, that New Holland makes a nice looking bale.

Nicer than my John Deere by a bit.

Course I was in road gear bailing raked hay.....

If I was not so lazy, I'd post the big squares we put up back about the first of June. If it don't rain, we may be feeding cows most of the summer.

Dry again Richard?

We have a plan right now. With the carry over hay we saved and what we will finish up this week on new hay we should have enough for the winter.

That will leave us about 600 acres of hay ground that we can graze. Not ideal, and leaves me kind of naked for next year...but we should not have to sell cows.

Looking at a water trailer though.

Jim we hauled a lot of water before my father drilled the well in 71. We do still haul to cows when grazing stalks in winter.

Can you find a tank that drains all the water? We are using a goofy plastic tank that holds six inches under the outlet valve.

Sheesh! Six inches is a lot.

I suppose the tanks I use drain to about three. They have an elbow inside that draws as much from the bottom as possible. Only other option would be a cone bottom tank on a trailer I suppose.


We drilled a well at home about 8 years ago. Before that we fought and fought for water. It makes 14 gallons....best well in this country by a fair piece. I witched it, drove the well driller nuts. He hates talk of witching wells.

Typical wells here flow 3 to 6 gallons.

Trouble is that well is not hooked to any pastures.

Couple years ago we dug in 24,000 feet of pipeline and a few years before that we put in 8000 feet. All hooked up to old wells, but not hooked together......yet.

Getting set up pretty well now, but we still are short with the drought. I have plans for another 34,000 feet plus some big cisterns.

Fight water all the time up here.

Figures though, normal precip is between 10-12 inches. Year to date we are at 2.

Jim, you do have water under ground? If you do, that has to help. Cattle, "Mamas don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys".

Good water really is something right now for sure Jim.


That sounds like a really nice project and I hope it functions well(no pun intended).

Hey you guys, thanks for the farmin' videos. Too cool. Honestly, just too cool.

I thought of you guys tonight.

They're at it on the Palouse too, went to town and saw these guys had stopped around 6:30. Must have been for dinner 'cause they were back at it on my way home at 9:00 or so. It was actually almost full dark, maybe only 15-20 minutes of dusk left when I took the pick. If I;m not mistaken this is their field hay. They have alfalfa down behind that little brush line past the field the tractor's working in, and up top past that alfalfa that's down is some spring wheat I believe. The wheat is just starting to turn brown up on top of that rise.



Guess they're earning their money today................as always.

Geno

Appreciate the reply Sam. When I had to live in Kansas, we got prairie grass hay. Up here it's timothy/brome.

Slightly elevate the other end, or (if you have one) put it on a dump trailer (or wagon) and just use the hoist.

Too bad you guys out west are always fairly short of rainfall. We've had more than enough to date - and another 1"+ is coming this morning.. But it held off long enough to get 2nd crop done on Monday.. We gaverhell and chopped the remaining 350A in a hair over 12 hours.. 3rd crop will be cut starting July 17th...

I like seeing all the video's of how it's done in other parts of the country, here is a video I did last year during third cutting.

https://youtu.be/BXF11n41m0M

Thats a good video.

Are those 3x3's?

cageycat,

cool stuff, nice video production, and a great looking spread.

I was going to ask where you were, but I found out looking at you posts from the election. Looks like I'll be retired to about 3 hours east of you folks.

Thanks for the video,

Geno

Jim, they are 15"×22" x around 44" bales.

Valsdad , nice country up here but the politics suck!!!

Jim,

Thank you and Sam both for the videos. I have subscribed to both of your channels now..

Ed

cageycat,

Yes, unfortunately it looks like we're retiring there in the NE corner for good. Wife took a pretty good job there last fall, we bought a place, and I was informed she's not moving again. After 19 or so moves in the last 18 years, between the two of us, separately and together, for career reasons, she's done. I can't hardly blame her but I was hoping her last career move might be to the mountains of AZ! (see my signature, I like the desert a bit, and it is close there)

So, after leaving Cali for what I thought was permanently in 1999, I'm back as a citizen. At least I am as far from SoCal as it is physically possible to be and still be in California. Great State but really screwed up politically.

Like you though, I'm in a rural, relatively conservative type county and have lots of outdoorsy crap to keep me from thinking about the masses in the rest of the state.

I hope your farming (and ranching? ) is profitable this year.

Geno

PS looked like the dog was having fun too!

PPS PM coming

Ed, I do believe you are the first subscriber!



grin

One from a couple days ago.





'Big rain'......yeah right, maybe a hundredth....keep on cuttin'...

Great photos Sam. Wonderful colors.


I bleeding hate seagulls.

Jim, it 'rained' just enough to make everything greener and then the sun kinda came out and I thought...cool...



The gulls returned when I was finishing up that field.

I didn't chance it and when a couple landed on a bale one just happened to go 'poof'....

The others all left...grin

Hehehe!

Bastids!

They are absolutely terrible....



I guess guys are turning cows out on peas. Must be too short to cut or they aren't filling?

A neighbor has a surprisingly good stand of spring wheat that is headed out so I went and pulled a couple plants but there is only one tiny tap root. I don't see how those heads can possibly fill...

Guys are getting a 1/4 ton to the acre on dryland hay....


It's just a total wreck.


Spring wheat market is going nuts.....

Yep, only worth anything when you dont have any.

Fellow from town was visiting with a fellow from your town the other day.

He was saying that a lot of the winter wheat is going to be put up for hay in your country.

Some spring wheat was headed for the same fate.

Makes good sense actually. If you could get a ton or so while its still green and sell it for a hundred bucks you would come out ahead.

If you wait and try to harvest it you could end up with nothing, if it didnt fill.

Nothing is filling up here.

I think we averaged a half ton per acre so far on the dryland.

I wonder what the feed value is in the spring wheat when it's green with empty heads?


Thought about asking my buddy(the neighbor) if he wants to let us hay it.


Also not sure when federal crop will clear the field(zero it out)....


All new to me.

I dont know about federal crop. Would have to check with the insurance man.

When it comes to wheat hay, I do everything wrong....according to the experts.

I like my wheat hay to be ripe.....I want the grain. We feed a lot of whole wheat.

Always figured that I could buy green stuff if I needed to.

Being a grass, I would assume that green wheat with no kernels would be similar to semi mature crested wheat grass hay as far as feed value.

I would be interesting to go cut a head apart and see whats in it. Probably find some kernels in the dough stage.

I know its an option, as several people have sold standing fields of winter wheat on dry years. Make better money than combining it.


A wheat bale that was put up with full heads and fully ripe with weigh in the neighborhood of 1700 to 1850 pounds. We figure that two thirds of that is grain.

Green wheat with empty-ish heads would should weigh similar to a grass bale, well maybe depending on the variety of wheat. Solid stem or hollow. I would guess 1100 pounds.

I'd turn the pressure up on the balers and make some toads...grin


I checked the heads, what the hell is it called, the flower stage?

Looked like they'd be in the dough stage but just the little tiny orange 'seedlings'.


Bet you could get maybe a ton/acre. More bales in the stack I guess. I have a feeling alfalfa is gonna be $200/ton this fall, the wheat out in the field should be worth roughly $20/acre to us if we hay it. And hell we're cleaning up the field for 'em.

Your highest protein/feed value on small grains hay is in the early dough stage. Most people let it over-ripen by way too much--then you might as well let it make grain like Jim does before you bale it.

First-cutting alfalfa was great here, now second-cutting is really thin. Drought conditions here also, but not horrible yet. Any good amount of rain would save us just fine, but it keeps going north to Canada or south to Nebraska. Lots of pairs being "culled" off early this year as the pastures don't look like much except already mature cool-season grasses.