I had mixed feelings when I got the telephone call from a neighbor down the road, alerting me that our order of 100 bales would be ready for pickup. Picking up hay is hot, hard, itchy work, but I know it has to be done. I made plans to take off 1/2 day from work and borrow my Dad's pickup truck and trailer and called back to confirm that we would pick up the hay Thursday afternoon around 1:30 pm.
We get a discount if we pick up the hay in the field right behind the baler, because that saves on Mr Myers' labor, so we arrived and looked out over the work to be done. A daunting task, indeed. Benjamin drove the truck, keeping it between the rows of freshly baled hay.
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| Hay Day |
We were able to get 18 bales on the bottom row and then 16 bales on the next successive layers going up. We quickly figured that we'd need to use the back of the truck to make them all fit. My Dad and my nephew, Conner, loaded the hay while I took pictures. Ha, No really, I did my share of loading, too!
Once we got 3 layers high, I climbed atop the trailer and as the bales were thrown, I positioned them so that they were stacked tightly and uniformly. We only live a mile from the hay field, but we wanted to be sure that we didn't drop any bales on the side of the road as we drove it on home.
As I was on top of the trailer, it gave me a good vantage point to see the operation. My neighbor was on his tractor baling hay and you can see an action shot of the baler below spitting out a bale in mid-air. We have been purchasing our hay from the neighbor for many years now. He's been very good to us. He stepped down from his tractor and walked over to visit with us. What a guy!
He told us that he is 84 years old and has no intentions of slowing down. Dad told him not to stop - that's what's keeping him going. He told us that after rigorous chemotherapy, he just had a PET scan and was cancer free! He beat the big C - nothing's gonna keep him down. You have to admire his work ethic and consistency.
His hay is high quality Alicia bermuda. You can read about Alicia and other varieties of Bermuda grass that will grow in Louisiana HERE Serious horse owners from miles around come and pick up hay from him as his reputation for quality hay and a fair price is well known. In fact, this hay is primarily used for race horses and our milk cows probably don't have the refined palates to really appreciate the top quality forage they are receiving, but what can I say? We pamper the old girls. We give them the best hay and in return, they give us the best milk.
When I pulled out some cash (egg money) to pay him for the 100 bales, I asked him how much. He replied, "The same price as last year." How often do you see that happening? The inflation rate in some parts of Jeff Davis Parish is flat. He told us that he normally gets three or four cuttings of hay in a year. This year with all the rain, though, the high water had washed in weed seed and he was going to burn the field and try to eradicate the weeds, so he may only get 3 cuttings. He is particular about the quality of his hay and it shows in the final product.
He said that he maintains his equipment himself and it is pretty much a family affair. He takes good care of his implements and they last a long time, but he lamented the rising cost of baling twine and parts for the baler. One thing that really saves him time and money is the implement you see in the center of the picture below. It is a trailer pulled by a tractor that picks up the bales with a conveyor belt and lifts and stacks it until the trailer if full. Then the trailer is brought to the barn and it lifts hydraulically, stacking the bales neatly in the barn, all while the driver sits in the cab of the tractor.
He told us that without that piece of equipment, he couldn't continue to make hay anymore at his age. He lamented the fact that in the past, you could get people to come load hay for pay, but no one wants to work that hard anymore. That says a lot about our modern culture right there. All in all, though, it was inspirational to visit with my neighbor - 84 years old and still going full throttle, with no signs of putting on the brakes. Impressive!!
He said that he maintains his equipment himself and it is pretty much a family affair. He takes good care of his implements and they last a long time, but he lamented the rising cost of baling twine and parts for the baler. One thing that really saves him time and money is the implement you see in the center of the picture below. It is a trailer pulled by a tractor that picks up the bales with a conveyor belt and lifts and stacks it until the trailer if full. Then the trailer is brought to the barn and it lifts hydraulically, stacking the bales neatly in the barn, all while the driver sits in the cab of the tractor.
He told us that without that piece of equipment, he couldn't continue to make hay anymore at his age. He lamented the fact that in the past, you could get people to come load hay for pay, but no one wants to work that hard anymore. That says a lot about our modern culture right there. All in all, though, it was inspirational to visit with my neighbor - 84 years old and still going full throttle, with no signs of putting on the brakes. Impressive!!
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| Labor saving Hay-Picker-Upper |
Our 'hay picker upper' was the old fashioned type. You know, where you grab the bale by the twine, lift and throw it up on top of the trailer! We stacked the hay one way and then the other on alternating layers to 'tie it all together' so it wouldn't fall.
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| Dad on top of the hay |
Before you could say, "Hay, Hay go away. Come again another day," we were done. The trailer and truck were loaded down with 100 bales of hay. We slowly made the 1 mile trek back to the house, checking to see that none of our precious cargo had fallen off.
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| Loaded up! |
I wish there were words to adequately describe the smell of fresh-cut and dried hay. It is a lovely smell and the sight of short cropped grass evenly mowed against the blue skies and sunshine brings you back to simpler times. Slower times with no cell phones, spreadsheets, and other modern accouterments to distract us or entertain us. Scratch the picture below and you'll get a big whiff of the hay smell I'm talking about. Hopefully, it won't make your hay fever flare up.
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| The Fragrance of Summer |
Unfortunately, we couldn't back the trailer next to the barn to unload it because it was still too muddy around there. I wasn't thinking and built the barn in the lowest part of the property and didn't build up the area with dirt. This year that caused a lot of needless work as we had to off-load the hay from the trailer and bring it to the barn in a wagon pulled by my lawn tractor, 6 bales at time, using a ratchet strap to tie them down on the little trailer. Then, using a pulley, we pull the hay up into the loft.
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| The Hay Loft |
As Benjamin hooks the twine, I use the pulley to hoist each bale up, swinging it into the loft and then sliding it down and stacking it up.
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| 1 down, 99 to go |
I took a picture of the last bale to be loaded in the loft. Although it is not a pretty picture due to the surrounding mud, it is a picture of completion as one more years' supply of hay is in the barn. We're prepared for winter now. Now we can fiddle! The capacity of the loft is 93 bales. The remaining 7 bales was stacked on a pallet in one of the stalls in the barn and then wrapped with a tarp to keep cows, chickens and goats from getting into it.
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| Whew! |
There is something to be said about hard work. When you finish an honest day's work in which your shirt and pants are soaking wet and your muscles ache, there is nothing as satisfying as a glass of cool water, a cold shower and a soft pillow to lay your head, drifting off quickly into a contented sleep, resting peacefully until the rooster crows again.
He who gathers in summer is a son who acts wisely, But he who sleeps in harvest is a son who acts shamefully. Proverbs 10:5
We went to sleep AFTER the harvest!
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