Latest worse hay crop ever

old

Well-known Member
So this is the latest I have ever cut hay. Yesterday I cut some 2nd cutting and it is the worse hay I have ever done. This year is the worst year I have ever had in the 37 years I have done hay on my place. Warm to early this year then a hard frost in April set every thing back then it got to wet then to dry and then a flood in July and then hot and dry again. I have areas where when your cutting it you cannot even tell you cut any thing so it makes it hard to keep on track
 
i here ya old.. up here in s.e. nebraska.. I dont remember the last time I had hay rained on so much.. at least 4 times this year on 4 different cuttings. But was able to dry it out. Just adds more work and fuel to the process. I usually get my last cutting off my place about now. Got 1/3 done and sold to neighbor.. been to wet to bother with the rest so it will stay put and catch snow this winter.. Not that tall but like to clean up usually before winter.. Oh welll.. time to start cutting wood now..
 
My problem is that is to dry and has been to dry after July. Cutting hay today there are a lot of places that even with getting 1.5 inches of rain over the week end you cannot tell we had any rain
 
This is the first time in 25 years of baling that I won't get 2nd cut on most of my acreage because it has been dry. Usually we get grasses come out of dormancy around mid August and start growing, this year nothing. I got 2nd on 50 acres back in July from some early 1st cut stuff and that was it. The weather nowadays here seems all or nothing.
 
What I did do was not worth the time or fuel to do. Got all of 2.5 big round bales of hay and used 10gal of gas doing it so in the long run it cost way to much to get what I did get
 
Last year I made the most hay I'd ever made off most of the places I cut this year was above average,I could go and cut a good amount of hay off most places now if I needed it.
Did cut enough late hay to bale up about 300 square bales even left some and didn't rake it because I got tired of handling the small bales.
 
(quoted from post at 10:13:47 10/23/17) What I did do was not worth the time or fuel to do. Got all of 2.5 big round bales of hay and used 10gal of gas doing it so in the long run it cost way to much to get what I did get

It might be the correct time to perform a soil test and possibly apply some commercial fertilizer along your horse manure.
 
I think to things come into play with my fields. Floods washed away a lot of organic material and also the weather so hay was bad. I have areas I not even going to cut or if I do cut it I'll leave it where it lays so as to put organic matter back in place and hope it does not flood again for s while plus going to plant a number of things so as to help at least slow down if not stop the water a bit
 
Wettest year on record UP here. Over 100 inches of rain in May thru Sept, and October has been no different. Can't remember a year trying to make hay on top of standing water all the time, or needing to run duals on the tractors to keep from cutting ruts all over. Neighbor had some cattle and a horse with their feet rot off because every bodies pastures have had standing water in them since snow melt. I keep saying to the wife "hopefully next year is better".
 
First year we attempted it ourselves, with a combination of quite old and quite new equipment. (An interesting few weeks/months getting the equipment together, and making it all work! I guess in the end it worked in our favor that it became so late in the year.....we weren't ready before anyway.)

Surprisingly successful, despite also being VERY wet early on in NEPA, and thus being VERY late in finally getting it done. Two goes: 9/11 for first cut of most of it, and 10/5 for second cut of a small field which was brush-hogged earlier in the year (still yeilded decent amount).

Lots of weeds: we spent two days picking out the milk weed!

Some pics:



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My Coastal Bermuda patch was looking pretty poor this year so I decided to run the Hay King Pasture Renovator over it this week. Didn't realize how long it's been since I disturbed the Houston Black Clay as in places I had to drop down to A1 on a 65 hp 4wd tractor to keep the rpm drop to less than 10% pulling 4 shanks 8-12" deep (rolling terrain).

So it looks like time for a full blown restoration. Gonna be the usual bumpy ride but in the end, next year's crop should be back in "Vogue". One thing for sure. The Bermuda will love me for it.
 

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