Swathing oats

David from Kansas · Jun 18, 2015

Swathed some of our oats yesterday. Best we have ever had. Hoping to get some drying days so we can get them baled. Will try to get some follow-up pics.

Dave H (MI) · Jun 18, 2015

Well that is a lot newer swather than mine! I did not know you cut them that green. Just curious, what do you do with your oats? I have a small field of them. Never grew them before. Everyone asks me if I have cattle and when I say "no", they look at me like I am nuts and ask me why I am growing oats then? This is confusing because mostly in the pasts I have heard that people WITH cattle were the crazy ones. 8)

David from Kansas · Jun 18, 2015

Yes, that is a new swather. Belongs to my son.

We bale and feed oats to our beef cows. This year we are planning on harvesting some seed to use next year.
The oats are in the milk stage. I didn't notice any seed loss as I was swathing, however, I'm sure there was some threshing done as they went thru the crimper.
These were planted March 11th and are extremely clean; not a sign of weeds.

s,mac · Jun 18, 2015

Great looking crop should keep the cows belly's full. Now I have to go cut grass hay for our cows. Steve

Part Time Pete · Jun 18, 2015

That looks like nice stuff - Are you able to make them into dry hay, or baleage.
I'd like to re-seed some of my hay fields using oats as a cover crop, and take the oats off late June, leaving the new seeding. I don't have a way to make haylage or baleage, so I'd have to be able to get it dry enough for small squares.
Pete

Allan in NE · Jun 18, 2015

Excellant hay!

Allan

gene bender · Jun 18, 2015

You dont need oats for a cover you can drill the seed direct and get a crop the first yr

sd pete · Jun 18, 2015

Looks good! Tat should keep a cow full.

keh · Jun 18, 2015

Very nice looking oats. My experience was that when cut in milk stage oats don't lose much seed. Cows have a fit over oats, almost as big a fit as horse owners have over them.

KEH

ohiojim · Jun 18, 2015

was just talking to a friend yesterday about the oats around here, not much over a foot tall,...won't be much straw from these fields

Billy NY · Jun 18, 2015

If that's not picture perfect, I don't know what is ! Clean field of oats, wonder what you would get for grain yield on that piece, sure looks promising. Nice to see these photos !

Brendon-KS · Jun 18, 2015

Your son has a nice choice in windrowers. Although the older WR9700 and the new WR9800 series are nearly identical on the outside this looks to be the newer model, correct? Is it a 9860 or 9870?

David from Kansas · Jun 18, 2015

Didn't even pay any attention to the model number. Just bought new this past winter. Just know it is a Massey-Ferguson (Hesston) and can really cut some hay. We cut some oats planted in alfalfa today and was running 13.2 MPH which is wide open in range 1. It will run 22 MPH on the road, which is about 10 MPH faster than our previous model.

sd pete · Jun 18, 2015

Those new Massey's will flat out cut lots of hay in a day. There is a lot of them up here.

Bruce from Can. · Jun 18, 2015

Got to be able to run fast ,to keep ahead of the payments.

Brendon-KS · Jun 18, 2015

It's most likely a WR9870 if it was running that fast through oats.

Swathing oats

David from Kansas

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Dave H (MI)

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David from Kansas

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s,mac

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Part Time Pete

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Allan in NE

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gene bender

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sd pete

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keh

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ohiojim

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Billy NY

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Brendon-KS

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David from Kansas

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sd pete

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Bruce from Can.

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Brendon-KS

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