Zen and the Art of Making Hay
Hay is synonymous with having ruminant livestock. Without it, it would be extremely difficult to keep those animals alive during the winter and under drought like conditions so common to the region. It is often the highest expense in any grazing operation. In my prior life in which we created a suburban homestead, what area that hadn’t been cultivated for gardening eventually ended up being pasture and what wasn’t grazed off by our sheep, I ended up making loose hay with a scythe and a rake. Even now, I still make a small amount of hay with a scythe. To me, there is something magical to waking up early with the first light, dew still on the grass, and hearing the sound of a scythe shearing grass blades into a windrow. To be self-reliant with the most basic of tools and provide feed for our livestock is a very gratifying feeling. There is a story book quality to this, but the reality is that it would be extremely difficult to produce enough hay in this manner to feed the flock of sheep I have.
This spring brought opportunity to take my hay making game to the next level. After culling heavily last year and the abundance of moisture which brought an explosion of growth to the pastures that the sheep graze, we simply could not keep up with the amount of forage growing. In a few of the locations we graze, the grass is taller than our sheep and they will simply disappear until the forage gets eaten down some. So not only was there hay to be cut, but the equipment to cut it was loaned out to me by neighbors. A sickle mower from one neighbor and a hay rake and small square baler from another. While I knew that the sickle mower and hay rake wouldn’t be a problem for my compact Kubota tractor, the big unknown was whether or not it could handle the baler. Also unknown was how the baler would do, as it has seen better days and although had been gone through, hadn’t been proven.
And so off I went, any spare moment that I had in between taking care of kids, chores, and building fences, I went to cut and rake the fields to try my hand at making hay. As expected, cutting and raking the hay went off without a hitch. Up next came baling. So off I went on my little Kubota to the neighbor where we hooked up the baler just to run the baler after having been gone through over the winter. With everything looking good, off I went to the field. With the help of the neighbor, I ran that tractor in the field and lo and behold hay bales start popping out behind me. Success! We dialed in a few things and off I went to bale what I had cut. Things were going really well, until all of a sudden I noticed that the tine pickups that lift the hay into the baler stopped turning. After shutting it down, A quick inspection found a broken chain, which brought an end to the day. But having an overall positive first experience was key. Hungry for more, I made the decision to cut more grass for hay. This time things didn’t end so well for the sickle mower. Almost at the end of cutting, I the sickle mower ended up having problems in which the knife bar got completely bent out of shape. With no more cutting going to happen and now a piece of equipment to fix, thank goodness raking the hay went without incident. And then came the baler. Having fixed one problem, the next time it went to the field was a disaster, problem after problem kept happening. Fixing one problem and then another problem would pop up. The last straw was when the baler stopped tying knots. At the end of a ten hour day, a mere thirty small bales of hay lay in the field.
While in the end a lot went wrong, the experience waspriceless. I did come away from it all comparing it closely to riding a motorcycle. While on the road you are in tune with your surroundings and yet able to contemplate various thoughts and ideas. A zen like experience. With that I did want to share another first experience. Ola Aina Farms got its first batch of USDA processed lamb back and if you would like to support the farm, please contact me to purchase some lamb raised with regenerative stewardship and on a forage only diet.
originally published in the Silverado Express 7/2022