Coyote Ridge FarmsWelcome To Our Rural Blog

After the storms last night, the downed hay was too wet to rake. What to do, what to do? In the morning, I went out to the field of freshly baled hay. If I can’t rake or bale I might as well roll the bales on their side. If one rolls the bales so the twine stings are not facing the ground, the mice can’t chew on them. The bales were too damp to stack. Like the hay that was down in windrows, the bales also need to dry.

I then put the bale spear on the loader in front of the IH 560 and then hooked the 3 pt bale forks on the back. The small square bales may be too damp to put-up, but the 600lbs round bales of ditch hay were not. I was able to collect 15-20 grass/mix bales that I got baled on Saturday. Hopefully, we’ll get another cutting from the ditches this year. Typically, we get two cuttings but this year it looks like we may easily get 3. What a difference a year with rain makes.

Out of the woods on my grandparent’s old farm, AND after cutting down some trees that seemingly impale anything that sets undisturbed for too long, I was able to recover an old, homemade, 30ft, hay elevator that my dad must have purchased years before his death, in 2005. After getting it back to the farm here, Madison and I squirted every chain link with penetrating oil… then she tapped each link with a hammer to break the rust. My initial fear was that if/when I put power to the elevator the chain would break, but it didn’t. Wouldn’t you know it but the old thing ran like a charm. It’s safe to say this year we will have an elevator to use for putting hay in the hayloft. No more throwing the hay up into the loft, no, no, no…. no!

BTW: According to the data recorded on our home weather station, last night we had wind gusts topping 66mph and sustained winds of 55-58mph. The winds were so strong that it took the hood of the pickup and tossed it nearly 25 ft. east.