Combine for rye

I don't have any experience with combines but am thinking of getting one in the future. I've been told that rye is difficult to combine. I want an older small so machine that could handle rye and oats mostly. How would a Case 660 with a 10' head work?

A 660 Case will have it's hands full in rye. Are you straight cutting the rye or swathing. I suppose if the rye doesn't break over you could cut only the top 12" of the crop.

We used to raise quite a bit of rye, that we combines with our 2 Cockshutt 112SP combines. Rye takes more power to thresh than most other small grains. We had to drive in low gear while combining rye.

My uncle came over with his 12ft pull type Case combine; his tractor would barely go slow enough for the combine to handle the rye windrows, cut with a 12ft. swather. We were dropping the straw to bale; my uncle made the comment that if he had to run the straw spreader his combine couldn't make it.

The 6, 7 and 9ft combines just didn't have enough HP to handle an average size windrow.

Before weed spray and fertilizer, we raised a lot of rye to kill wild oats. Rye roots will work their way into the wild oats kernel and destroy the kernel. After raising a good crop of rye, we would have two years of crops before a new crop of wild oats emerged.

If the rye is standing it isn't any harder to cut than wheat. If it goes down, it will be a lot harder because of the extra material to run through. Many times when cutting standing rye you never touch the header lift. You just run it high and drive. Mike

I cut 30 acres a year of rye for seed with a 105 Deere with a 13 ft head. I have used the 95 but prefer the 105 as it has more power and more cleaning area for a better sample. I like my rye all standing(which never happens) or all flat(most of the time). The worst id half and half because if you set the reel for the down stuff the tall standing grain will wrap on the reel.I tried windrowing but it would not work.I have a Deere 800 with 11ft. cut and when the grain came to the middle it was to much material and would plug up. We have windrowed wheat and plan to windrow oats this year. We do fertlize our rye and right now it is taller than me in many places. Tom

Where I live, straight cutting rye would be a bad idea. By the time the moisture in the head is low enough to bin the seed, quite a bit would have shelled out onto the ground.
Rye doesn't need fertilizing either. It has the longest roots of all the cereal grains and will go deep to recover any fertilizer you used on a previous crop. Adding fertilizer is just asking for too much growth which makes it more susceptible to lodging. Without fertilizer being added, it takes a much worse storm to lodge my rye that is 6 feet tall than oats at 4 feet or semi-dwarf wheat at 3 feet.
When it is dry, rye is not difficult to thresh except that there will be a lot of straw. I swath mine and often leave a foot or more stubble to reduce the amount of straw that has to go through the combine. If I were saving the straw for baling, I would cut it lower but there is a load of soil nutrients tied up in the straw and removing the straw removes the nutrients it pulled up from deeper in the soil. That means that the next year's crop will need additional fertilizer to replace it. Some of my best hay was on a field where I raised rye 2 consecutive years, plowing in the straw each time.

Have you had good results raising rye two years in a row? I would like more acres but have a hard time getting corn harvested in time to plant rye. I have thought about rye two years in a row but was afraid of disease pressure as we sell ours for seed.We fertlize because we want all the staw we can get and harvesting down rye is not hard as it most often goes down about six inches off the ground.After rye harvest we notill 2 bu oats and tillage radishes for a soil builder. What windrower do you use? My 800 Deere will not handle the large amount of straw. What yeilds do you get? Thanks Tom

Another thing about Rye is never put it in the bin a little wet, thinking it will be ok. Rye and Millet are dynamite in the bin wet,it will destroy itself and turn to mold quickly.

I didn't notice any difference in the yield that couldn't be explained by the weather. Rye isn't as susceptible to disease as some grains and 2 years in a row isn't really enough to make much difference in my area.

I can have the option of cutting with my old Versatile 330 or my Deere 800. With poorer soil such as I am blessed with and not fertilizing, either the 15 or 18 foot header works fine, much better than when I use them to cut Mammoth Red Clover.

Tom, rye only needs to be in the ground before it freezes solid. Don't be afraid of planting it late.

Are you sure there isn't a adjustment to make the hole bigger in the swather ,where it comes together to make the windrow, i know the Versatile swather does, You make the canvas shorter, and have to bolt the, roller for the canvas, on to another set of bracket's 3-4 inches wider i am talking about a 18 foot swather or bigger.

RAISED IT FOR YEARS on sand ground for the straw,it will be the cleanest and brightest out there for straw. sold it to the hy-vee stores, grain was sold to seed companies for seed always used what machine i had at the time last was 6620 titan two 15ft head. cut as low as possible as main goal was baling straw. those days are pas now thou as business i now have took over. still get calls for small squares thou even thou its been nine years since quit