Hillside Baling Experiences

How many of you make square bales on hillsides? What is your strategy and experiences when dealing with hills? Tractor and square baler only and tractor, baler w/wagon in tow? Ever had the baler jackknife the tractor or the trailer jackknife the trailer? I've been on one runaway wagon load of hay many years ago. The wagon was pushing a JD 24t baler and it was pushing a Ford 3600 diesel. The driver managed to keep everything good until we stopped - moderate hill too.

We've got some hills that we are reclaiming this winter. The best way to describe what we are going to bale is not so much hillsides, but crowns on the top of the hills. Our plan is to go around the crown and keep the hill slope to the sides. We are also going to erect storage sheds at the top of the crowns such that we are always pulling up if we are parallel with the slope. Anything considered to steep, we'll drop on the ground and hand load a truck or maybe a wagon w/half load, 50 ish bales to keep from being pushed around. Bottom line is safety.

But.....

I'd be interested in hearing your hillside square baling experiences, tractor, baler and wagon - if used and how you managed (or didn't) year in and year out.

Thanks!
Bill

All of the above. I've seen wagons go over sideways and backwards. I never fell out the front. I don't know why. Balers are heavier than they look and will push a smaller tractor. Try to be safe and you will find out what works and what don't and hopefully you will live to be able to use your new-found wisdom.

Had a friend killed a few years ago when a wagon load he was going down hill with jack knifed and the tractor rolled over, just too much weight pushing the tractor. We usually just drop the bales on the ground & pick them up with a pick up truck. Lots easier and there are darned few teens now days that can stack hay on a wagon so it will stay on there. Most of our fields are reclaimed strip mines so they can get pretty steep. Also have had some round bales roll down into the woods, aint gonna stop them when they get going LOL. Just my thoughts, Keith

If it is real steep we make windrows up and down. For contour baling I start at the bottom and work up, that way the bales that roll downhill don't stop on a windrow that you need to bale. There is no pulling a wagon, bales have to be picked up by hand onto a low sled.

We use kicker wagons on slopes that you can barely walk on. You do not HAVE to file a wagon full before you unload it. LOL I also never use a smaller tractor on a baler of any kind, round or square. The smallest is a JD 4020 and even then I watch how I bale on the side hills. I bale on the contours. Sometimes have trouble hitting the wagon with the thrown bales with the wagon leaning so much. Another thing it to have good wagons. A fifty year old Sears 4 tom wagon is an accident waiting to happen on a side hill. I have eight and ten ton wagons under all the thrower racks.

How about rotational grazing ? I had tractors get pushed on hillside and the best old steel seat and one foot on the fender to keep from sliding off the seat. Glad my farm is flat with few bad spots

When I was in high school in 1961, I was baling in steep hills with a 48 JD B and a 50T IH baler, and pulling two 10' wagons in stacked 4 or 5 high with 65# small squares. When I reached the steep part of the road in, I survived by pulling back on the clutch so that I could keep the B ahead of the wagons for 50' or so until I got to where it wasn't so steep and I could push the clutch back in and slow down. Sometimes I had to stop and pick up a few bales.

At the time, I thought that was the way everybody had to do it!

I wouldn't dream of doing it now without putting at least a 7,000# tractor in front of a baler that heavy and using a 7'x16' trailer instead of 2 wagons to haul in with. Mel

In my youth ,I had some rented ground that no one else would want ,probably why I could get it. And it was better suited to goat pasture, but we baled it. Back then I was to poor to have any thing good to work with like a bale thrower and wagons. I just had a little Case 430 , a number 46 IH baler and a bale buncher that dragged behind the baler. I could pretty well always leave the bunches of bales in locations that the wagon could sit sort of level to load bales on. Worked well enough.Later when I put a slide shoot on the baler and pulled the wagon , with a kid loading , no good at all, back to the buncher for the hilly fields.

Knuckle-head that bailed our place a few years ago managed to roll one into the pond where we couldn't get it out. gm

The first farm I bought right out of high school had some steep hills on it and baking was a real challenge. We used a heavier tractor tho so runaway were not a problem. But keeping the load on the wagon could be. But the most harrowing experience I had was while combining there. I bought a jd 55 with a 2 row head and was doing the side hill east of the house. While on the steepest part the combine came to a stop, when I looked the upside wheel was spinning. I turned the wheels down hill, held the topside brake, and backed down the hill. I had a near full hopper then so that made the combine top heavy too. When I got my nerve up and went back I could see that that top side wheel hadn't left a track in the dirt for most of 100 feet or so.

My F-I-L somehow managed to roll a small square baler on this farm. It's steep.

Don't short on the tractor and don't short on the gears and tires. I pull a 336 baler with 8 and 9X16 thrower racks with a 4430. Better to burn a little more fuel than to be laying underneath a turned over tractor.

Always turn uphill. Jackknifing happens when the rack is heavier than the baler and is pointing downhill.

Keep good quality tires on the rack and don't over load them. Old car tires blowing on the downhill side will roll a rack. I run 9.5l 15s on my 8 by 16s and 11l 15s on my 9 by 16's.

Try to bale the steep stuff in the first half of the load and move to less rolling ground to finish out the load. If you don't have to go far with the loads, only load the wagons halfway and take them in to unload.

I loaded wagons on some pretty steep contours. I had to hang the bale off the edge of the wagon when starting a load. By the time we were at the end of the contour the bales had worked their way down hill to where they should be. We didn't make very big loads though. Only three or four high. When you have part of a load of bales slide off the side of a wagon you figure things out pretty fast.

I find baking on steep hills real challenging also.

Here is a video of someone hillside haying. Note how the guy stacking is leaning to the side on the trailer at times!
Hillside Baling Video

Our fields, that were in hay way back when, were mild, some terrain features, small hills etc. In this area, many fields are slopes, its similar to West Virginia, but I think those are more substantial. We used to bale a large field, 20+ acres for a neighbor, across the old fence/hedge row. '64 4000 Ford, 532 Ford baler and 1 of 3 Lamco wagons. On one part of it, 3 of us hung on to the up hill side of the wagon to get through. Most of the field was manageable, actually a really nice field that grew some good hay, thick orchard grass crop as I recall.

The farmer I used to help had many fields in crops that were steep slopes, he did both small squares and round bales. He made round bales on the steeper fields given the risk with the small squares and thrower wagons. Over the years I am sure he had plenty of stories to tell and reflect back on. I know his oldest was in a wagon that overturned. In those days it was only small squares.

When he got his new JD round baler in '08, it was interesting to see how ejecting them by backing up to one side would keep most from rolling down the hills. Not all though. One field, a long slope, rectangular the long ways, sloped that way, 7420 and 583 sileage special round baler, 4440 and NH 315 baler working on windrows that went across, + the sileage body tandem mack, and his brothers pick up truck, of all places at the bottom of the field, there were plenty of targets out there. Every so often one would take off rolling, so as I waited to load, I never turned my back on the up hill side, 700lb 4x5's to look out for. His son ejected one, way up top, did not get it to stay and it was rolling, gaining a little speed but not accelerating too much. I stood there with the farmers brother, seeing the trajectory of that bale and his truck, and after some hesitation, I took off across this field to head off this round bale to keep it from eventually hit his truck. I sprinted across, luckily no chuck holes or similar, had a good angle of pursuit, caught up to the bale as it aligned with my path. I was not stupid enough to get in front of it, rather went behind it and used my forearm/elbow as a brake to slow it, stayed on it and finally got it to stop. These were dense net wrapped bales, I was careful to not let it carry me up and over, and if it was too much, I'd have either fought it to the bottom or til it stopped, thankfully its speed was not enough that I could not overcome it. His brother still remembers it to this day whenever I see him. He says "you still chasing round bales in fields?" LOL.
The farmers son on the round baler, said I don't know how you did it, stopping that bale.

Well I was getting used to it. Having been doing all the loading and trucking, I had one or 2 get rolling, one just started, I out ran it with the tractor and was able to head it off with the spear. We did have fun getting some of these out of small ravines/embanked streams etc. There were more of them that disappeared through the hedge row than I thought, baled when I was not there etc.

All I have ever baled is side hills. I always figured the secret is traveling them on a diagonal line, and when in doubt let the rake do the work. Keep the baler and wagon where you feel reasonably safe.

You need enough tractor to safely handle the load pushing you downhill.

(quoted from post at 07:01:55 12/06/15) All of the above. I've seen wagons go over sideways and backwards. I never fell out the front. I don't know why. Balers are heavier than they look and will push a smaller tractor. Try to be safe and you will find out what works and what don't and hopefully you will live to be able to use your new-found wisdom.

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You nailed it. Balers are a lot heavier than you would think. Add a load of bales behind on a wagon and it can really push a tractor around. So the heavier the tractor the better off you are. We have hills around here that I would never consider a tractor, baler and wagon combo with a tractor smaller than about 7,000 pounds with good brakes. A Ford 3600 maxes out at about 6,900 pounds fully weighted up. Baled a lot of hay on a lot of hills with a tractor, 24T and wagon behind a tractor that scaled in at 7K before weight was added. This one had fluid in the tires and rear wheel weights so it was considerably heavier than that. Would load anywhere from 120 -175 bales on a wagon depending on the size of the wagon. Never had a problem.

Rick

I have had hills where my Ford 6610 is barely enough with a full load, do not load the wagons full if you have a smaller tractor.

Around here in the 60' & 70's the really steep ground was in grass, of course it's pretty well corn and soybeans now. Anyway stacking bales on a rack was an adventure trying to keep them from sliding off and there was always at least a 3020,706 sized tractor in front of the baler, most of the time 4020's,1850's or 806's. I've got a spot that I learned to never dump a round bale out. I tried to put a little extra on the bottom side of the bale but whenever I dumped 1 out there it would roll or bounce end over end down the hill. Got to driving down the hill to dump the bale out.

We baled on hillsides and if you use common sense you will no problems. We baled with ether a JD-A or Farmall M pulling a JD 14T pulling a wagon. We baled up and down hills and side wise on hills. Some fields you had no choice of which way you baled it you just baled it. If we had to bale a hill to steep to bale sidewise with wagon we would drop the bales on ground and come back latter with wagon and pick them up.

Fence it and let the livestock figure it out.

I bale crowned fields. The guy loading in that video is keeping them inside the edges but that makes for a small load. Going down hill is just as bad as hillsides. Lots better is your fields are smooth. For me it's harder to do a good job opening up a field if I can't see the far edge. I have certain trees I use to navigate. Good tires on the tractor and weight is the key, and try to rake smooth turns.

Put a good size tractor on the baler, a baler with a factory hitch not an add on, and an appropriate size wagon. Bale the steeper parts of the field first onto the load and then finish out the load on the leveler parts of the field.

Dick2 has it figured out. l.o.l.

Back in the "Day", a fellow not too far away asked if Dad would bale a field for him and Dad said "If you can cut it and rake it, I;ll bale it....

Well, at that time we had an old Case baler that needed 2 men riding on it to tie the bales...and as it turned out, they had to have one of Mom's Brothers stand on the up-hill axle of the JD "B" (Her driving) and it was said that the first 14 rounds, the bales all rolled down to the fence at the bottom..

I remember them baling Soybean trash with that Case baler and Gawd did the guys working on the baler get plastered with dust...!!
That baler had a Wisconsin V-4 for power..

I work quite a bit of steep ground with a NH 316 and kicker wagons. When you mow, you'll want to mow it how you would like to bale it. You want to be able to start your loads on the steep ground, then have a flatter place to go and finish them up.
You want enough tractor so it doesn't get pushed around, but you also want a baler that's heavy enough so it doesn't get pushed around either, particularly when you're making turns.
Bottom line - take small bites, and chew them well...

(quoted from post at 19:13:21 12/06/15) Fence it and let the livestock figure it out.

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That, or give all the steep/rough ground back to the natives.

Use a big enough tractor. Prior to about 1960 we had 2 tractors, a Farmall M and a Super C and when the cultivator was on the M the Super C had baler duty on a few acres here and there. We only had about 8 acres that was steep and I was driving and my brother was stacking the wagon, got just about to the top of the hill and started to spin the tires, jamming the brakes didn't do anything so I pushed the clutch and brakes and it all slid down the backwards, seemed like it slid a mile, probably more like 50 foot till it jack knifed, think it only wrecked the wagon tounge. The M would bale the hill with no problem. The Super C would pull it's guts out but was a little light for heavy work.