Time to Bale that Hay..............

My Farmer servicing the baler.

Now on to baling.  Baling the hay is the tricky part.  You don't want it to dry or to wet.  If you bale it to wet it will mold and if it is really wet, it can get hot and actually burn.  Not a good thing.  We let the hay get dry, which usually takes 3 to 4 days, and then bale it in the evening with a little dew on it.  The dew helps  hold the hay together and keeps the alfalfa leaves from shattering.  However, when the dew gets to heavy, we have to stop.  Our balers have moisture sensors in the bale chamber that measures the moisture content of the hay and displays it in the tractor.  Very seldom do I run the baler.  I can, but luckily I don't have to very much.  We have two balers, one makes small bales, and one makes big bales.  The small bales usually average around 110 pounds, and the larger bales are 3X3's and they average around 950 pounds.    

This is our big baler picking up the windrow of hay

This is our little baler.

Here's Pete trying to lay in the shade of the bale.

 After the hay is baled, the last step is hauling it to the barn.  We use a stacker wagon to do this, and we actually use it for both kinds of bales.  The machine picks up the little bales by itself as you drive along. 

To stack the big bales, we load them on to the stacker with a fork lift.

Yep, that's my Farmer wearing shorts.....it was really hot that day!!

OK, so now all the hay is put away, and we have a break for a little while until it is ready to harvest the 2nd cutting.  Which, by the way, is now.  Not much of a break, but oh well, we'll live with it.  That's "livin' the farm life"...........Gotta love it!!!!!!

Could have, would have, should have...............

OK, so I'm not very good at this.  One week ago, I told myself that I was going to be committed and blog 3 days in a row, telling our haying process, with pictures and all, each day a different step.  Well, that didn't work did it!!!  I guess it goes to show that I really do not have much control over my life.  (that's my excuse anyways, and I'm sticking to it!)  Oh, if I would have stayed up really late each night, I probably could have gotten it done.  But, you see I really like my sleep, and after doing what ever it was I did during the day, I was tired.  And if I would have gotten up early in the morning, I probably could have gotten it done.  But, I really do not like mornings, so I do not usually get much done in the mornings.  I know, you are thinking that you thought farmers got up with the sun to go to work.  Well, my Farmer does, and that's when I get my best sleep!  So, I am just writing this short little blog to say, Hey, I'm still here, and one of these days, I will finish the haying, both real and blogging.  Thanks for hanging in there with me.

and Now we're Raking Hay

Well, you guessed it.  My Farmer found something for me to do yesterday.  He was delivering hay and asked if I would like to ride along.  (Yep, he needed help)  "Well, of course, I would love to", was my cheerful response.  The help he needed was driving the tractor from the unloading dock, down the highway, to the place where the hay was going.  Not a problem, except that everyone else on the two lane, curvy canyon highway was doing 60 mph and I was doing 7.25 mph.  My tractor should have been able to do 17.5 mph, but something is wrong with the hydraulics, so 7.25 was my top speed.  I gained a few new gray hairs, but made it safely.  And learned that I am SO thankful that we do not farm by a busy highway.  Anyways, now back to sharing the next step in our "making hay" process.

 This is the view from my tractor seat looking backwards at the rake.  We use ancient rakes.  I would love to have one of those big double rakes, but they cost lots of money and are just not in the budget at this time.  Maybe someday.   There are two basic reasons we rake or turn our hay. One is that the windrow our swather leaves is a little to wide for our baler to pick up. And the second reason is to help with the drying time.  Turning it fluffs the hay and helps it dry.  But only if you do it at the right stage. If we turn it a day early, it sometimes will add a day of drying time, which is not a good thing.  Also if it is alfalfa hay, we like to turn it in the morning with a little dew, before it gets to dry, so the leaves do not shatter to much.
The next picture is from my tractor seat looking forwards.  You can see the turned rows, the unturned rows, and my Farmer on the tractor in front of me.  (And I'm sure he was saying "she should be working not taking pictures".  Oh well)

In this picture you can see the turned hay and in the distance the next step, baling. So come back tomorrow and we will bale some hay.  Once again, as long as my Farmer doesn't have another job for me.(haha)

Time Flies when your Making Hay

Time flies when you're having fun.  So the saying goes.  Well, I'm not real sure how much fun I have been having, but the time sure is flying.  It has been over 3 weeks since I have had a chance to sit down and write something in my blog.  We have been very busy haying, and it has taken us a little longer than it should because of the weather.  But, we finally finished with our 1st cutting.  And good thing, cuz it's time to start the 2nd cutting!  When we first started out this year, I carried my camera along with me so I could blog and share what we were doing as we were doing it.  However, as you can tell, that didn't happen.  I got the pictures taken, but didn't get them shared.  I finally have time to share, so here goes.  The above picture is my Farmer swathing hay. This is the first step in the process of making hay.  (well, that is after it has been established into a hay field, you know, like planted and grown)  Here are two more pictures of swathing. 

nice windrow of hay with our dog Pete standing guard.

We raise straight alfalfa hay and an orchard grass and alfalfa mix hay.  After the hay is cut, it will usually take about 3 to 4 days to dry before we can bale it.  I do enjoy driving the swather (after all, it does have a cab, air conditioning, and a radio), but I usually don't get to run it very much.  My father-in-law usually gets that job.  As I said in my previous blog, my main job during haying season is raking.  I will share that job here on my blog tomorrow, granted that my Farmer doesn't find something exciting for me to do away from the house.