when to swath oats?

Fordfarmer

Well-known Member
I've swathed part of my oats the last two years, but in both cases, it was after I found a swather, and I only did it to dry out the weeds...the oats were already mature and dry. Since I don't have to look for a swather this year (bought a GOOD one last year, not a POS like 2 years ago), I can be more flexible as to when I start swathing. But when is too soon? Do you normally let the oats get dry, or hurry the process by swathing? No neighbors to watch or ask - not much swathing gets done around here, and really not even much small grain gets combined any more - mostly used as forage. I have about 55 acres of oats, and will probably swath 35 acres. The rest looks clean enough to direct cut.
 
Here we are about all done, swathed and combined.

You can go a tad early with the swather, before the grain goes down and you lose some. Instead of ripe oats, it can have a hint of green......

Paul
 
I would normally have some combined by now, but planting was way late...most of my corn was in before I even started planting oats. Sounds like I can start swathing as soon as the forecast is good, then. On the 1st field, anyway.
 
I'm done, finished baling the straw on Saturday here in MN. I wait until the field has a definite golden color and any green color is contained to the bottom third of the stalks. Then I let them lay a week or longer before I combine them. Seems to work good as I have not yet had any trouble with oat loss to over ripeness and no heating or spoilage due to them being too green.
 
How come you guys "swath" the oats? I always just combined mine, cut 'em short if I wanted to bale the straw.
 
Larry, I am with you Why Do they need a extra step of Swathing them first, before they combine them????
You would think Someone would answer this simple question????? Here in Texas we Only swath them if we are going to Bale them. If we are harvesting them then the combine gets fired up and away we go!
I prefer starting Mid Milk to and finish before early dough. anything after that and there is too much shatter of grain! for hay!!
Later,
John A.
 
Same here, planted the sand hill to oats over alfalfa reasonably timely, very close to May. The second field like you, was almost done with corn before got it in the ground, half way through May, but I like to put some turnips down for the cows to graze later, and a place to spread manure, so really wanted that 4-5 acre field....

Well with the cool summer, turned out well, got what looks like 700-750 bu of oats off those nine acres - yea I'm big time this year with the small grains. ;)

We swath around here because of the typical humidity, nothing really dries down on the stem until October 'here'. If you don't cut it, the weeds come through, if you cut it parts of the small grain is over ripe, the other part is still green.... The humid climate just dictates it has to get cut and allowed to all dry down.

I ended up swathing for 2 of my neighbors this year, they were hoping to straight combine, but it rarely works well 'here'. Esp thos of us that put a cover crop or alfalfa seeded in with.

Paul
 
Most guys around here (n/w WI), if they plant small grains at all, chop them for silage. Or make high moisture bales or green chop. Near impossible to make dry oat hay here, unless you wait until it's too mature to make -good- hay. I'm one of only a few left around here who combine oats for grain. I direct cut when I can to save the extra trip/time/fuel of swathing, but if a field has weeds (often, even if sprayed) or isn't ripening evenly, swathing can let you get the combining done sooner, and keeps the oats from heating in the bin.
I've also learned that "swathing" falls into the group of terms that have different regional meanings. Here, swathing is cutting, usually with a draper type machine, and NOT conditioning a crop. Cutting with an auger-type machine, especially if it has a conditioner, is "windrowing" or simply "mowing".
 
Sometimes they do not ripen evenly(green heads),or green weeds come in.'swathing'(draper machine,no crimper)lets everything dry out so you get clean DRY grain in the bin.Direct cutting puts all the wet stuff right in the bin.
 
come to Mn and try it, I will sit in the shade and laugh as you unplug your combine stuffed up with wet straw, and a few weeks later it will spoil in the bin after it goes through a sweat, you can often straight cut wheat here but not oats, us people that windrow oats are not stupid, we wouldn't do it if we didn't have to
 
Fordfarmer, Thank-You for the reply. I do forget that there are places where crops just will not dry down like they will here in Cen-Tex. Oats and wheat are an arm and arm crop both planted in the fall, Cattle and Deer Graze on it all winter. Come spring both will finish up about the same time. I can sure see where weed pressure would make the swathing ahead of time a more desirable route to go too! Thank You Again
Later,
John A.
 

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