Lots of Bales and Stormy Skies
28 August, 2009 - 07:31
Haying continues. We really made a bumper crop on our second cutting. Before we started yesterday, we had 241 rolls or about 7 rolls per acre (3.85 tons). That is about as good as it gets. Karl's vision of the Rocky Branch Grass Ranch focused on forages has come true.
It was cloudy yesterday and we still had 30 acres of hay on the ground to bale. South of the ranch at the house we had a 1 inch rain, but it was dry there. We brought in a
tedder to fluff and toss the hay about to get it to finish drying and started to bale about 4:00 p.m. With any luck they baled most of that field before the dew set in.
I love to see a field full of hay bales. Of course, in our case we have to store them and need a better plan than what we have. We have two hay barns and are partially full. Since you never know if the next few years will be drought years, we need to save this hay for ourselves. The plan we have hatched is to take out of the barn old hay for that will be fed late this fall and in the winter. That is about 120 tons of hay or 175-200 rolls. This will make a lot of room. We can stack this hay so it can be covered and the rain will stay off it. We can then fill the barns with the new hay and any left over we can store outside covered.
At this point we have no plans for a third cutting, but will let the standing hay be available in the field for the cattle to graze on after frost until it is gone, then start to give them hay.