Grass Hay - Poor Man's Conditioner

So you got your disc mower (or in my case a sickle mower) - no conditioning rolls, just a straight cutting mower.

You got grass hay like timothy or orchard grass - no alfalfa.

In as much as you don't have any roll or flail conditioning the hay off the cutter.

When you ted your grass hay, do you run your tedder at full 540 rpms or somehow adjust your tine pitch such that it not only spreads/fluffs the
hay, but beats the crap out of the stems and in doing so, gives you some measure of conditioning.

Anyone use their tedder as (for lack of a better word), a poor man's flail conditioner?

Just curious.

Thanks!
Bill

That's my method exactly, cut with a sickle, come right back and ted it hard, ted again to help dry as needed but at a reduced PTO speed. This is Bermuda Bahia mixed grass.

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I condition, but I just can't imagine a Tedder wacking the stems hard enough to make them crack as a crimper does. Even if they did it would be only a very small proportion. nowhere near enough to make a difference in drying time.

I cut some pretty heavy hay sometimes with a NH 456 mower and rarely use a conditioner.My conditioner which I use maybe once or twice a year is a NH 404 that I can hook behind the
456.I like to bale hay just like it was cut so the stems in the round bale will shed water.

In this country with grass, all ya have to do is cut 'er and wait. Depends on the tempreature of course.

Allan

Basket or spinner type tedders are a delicate tool. They don't take rough use very well.

I make mostly Orchard/Timothy horse hay. I Tedd with a Haybob at low speed, just enough to fluff it up, flip it, mix it,to let the air and sun get to the underside to dry the cut hay thoroughly. A haybob is a tough critter, but I don't think it is capable of breaking the stems hard enough to have a crimper effect.

A tedder will not perform that function at all, but with higher stubble height, taking shorter cuttings, when the weather is ideal would work much better. There are windows of weather sometimes where the first cut is still like a good 2nd cut,(early) where if you were to cut it, in ideal weather, it will dry nicely. The tedder may be a valuable tool for that and if it plays out, it will be a nice green hay, vs one thats been sun bleached with longer dry times. I do the same thing on a small scale and can show you 2 examples of contrast difference, one cutting taken at longer height, lots more volume, longer dry time, the other less height in cool dry weather, a little higher moisture when taken, but very green. I had to do some supplemental drying or lets say I fluffed the small stack as it was store inside and it "cured" in a sense, no molding, so the moisture was close to max but not over the threshold. This is not a hay crop, small hobby that feeds very small critters, and you can tell what they like best, the darker greener stuff.

An early first cut if you will, not so dense to dry, if the weather cooperates, less yield, higher quality, and when its supple and leafy, no coarse stubble, so cut at full depth, it can dry rapidly because its just not a dense/heavy cutting. More so if I was using just a sickle, which we did use in the past before the mower conditioner.

I agree with the others the tedder will not serve as a poor man's conditioner.

What will serve as a poor man's conditioner is using the bush hog to cut your hay with. Depending on how it discharges it sorta mangles the grassy types of hay a bit and actually even tenderizes the stemmy stuff a bit making it more palatable to animals. That all said you will suffer yield loss and I would not think of doing it on leafy crops

I cut with a bush hog my first several years of making my hobby mostly grassy hay. The crop I put up was always beautiful and the animals loved it as it was always tender and soft. I mainly quit using the bushog more due to time constraints when cutting as the bushog was slow going in tall heavy crop. The yield loss did not bother me too much as it ws otherwise a zero maintenance cutter. Sharpen the blades and grease it and use it. Also idiot proof for an unskilled operator to run.

(reply to post at 02:17:24 09/29/15)

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Tedder run near 540 with decent ground speed.

Tedder is not a conditioner, it does help speed drying by spreading out the swath better.

Sun and wind dry the hay, not the tedder. I've cut and baled in less than 24 hour span with no conditioner, just a tedder. Key thing is weather!