One Sunny Day Does Not Make Hay

showcrop · Jun 12, 2015

I had to go to my church first thing yesterday to take care of a problem. On the way I passed a field of new mowed hay. The forecast here day before yesterday was for half decent Wednesday after rain Tues eve. Yesterday was sunny and hot though very humid. Today was predicted to be cloudy with rain tonight. This fellow is an old timer with probably ten years on me. He mows with just a sickle bar and has no tedder, and would have mowed Wednesday PM. The piece of ground is very dry, so maybe he got it made yesterday, but I think that it is doubtful. At best I expect that it will end up dusty if he did bale it. This is not unusual for him and it just occurred to me this morning that he must not have internet to get the detailed forecasts that most of us use now.

Lazy WP · Jun 12, 2015

I have been watching the weather, to a certain extent. This year they are pretty close. WET, but most years the detailed forecasts aren't worth the time it takes to read
them.
I had planned on mowing 20 acres of Brome today, but its so foggy I am not going to try it, this morning anyway. Looks like we should have 2 1/2 dry days!!

Carlyle hoffman · Jun 12, 2015

One thing is for sure never have seen HAY in a barn without mowing it first, risks of a HAY farmer.

K Effective · Jun 12, 2015

The neighbor stopped last night to ask if I was going to bale the field behind his house, or should he brush chop it?!? Of course, I said, as soon as we have more than one dry day in a row, I'll get it done! I have spoken to him several times about our arrangement this year alone, now he thinks he should cut down "my" hay because I am not on his schedule? hmmmm.

Anonymous-0 · Jun 12, 2015

What does the internet know aboot hay?
Back in my day before the unreliable weather forecast on the internet, wee wood mow hay look at it to see if dry nuff to bail,bale the hay, haul into barn all without the handicap of the electronic gizmos.

paul · Jun 12, 2015

I've tried making hay according to the weather guessers the past few years.

I think the biggest mistake of my farming career......

Need to go back to just make hay when the farm gut says to go mow now...... Forget the high priced weather guessers.

Paul

RayP(MI) · Jun 12, 2015

Even though rain is lacking here (previous to last night - this morning), i have had trouble getting hay dry. Baled a load yesterday that was cut week ago tuesday. Raked it three times to try to speed drying. Heavy with alfalfa and weeds, especially white cockle. Stems hard drying. Even with no rain.

Dave H (MI) · Jun 12, 2015

I look at the morning sky, then turn on any weather source that has a map with isobars. I combine that with a glance at the time lapse radar....decide. Hay has been rained on once that I can remember in all these years. If your farm gut cannot predict the weather where you live, then you should probably get indoor work.

rrlund · Jun 12, 2015

Sometimes desperation trumps common sense.

Richard L · Jun 12, 2015

Many years ago I helped a friend on their farm when they made hay. I would ride my bike two and a half miles to help. One year I could not believe what the father did. He listened to the weather report and every time they said a very good chance of rain within the next two days he would have us go mow the hay that day. Then next day it got turned over then on third day we baled. He never had any wet hay that year. He told us you can't trust the weathermen. Now with the great improvements in forecasting I do not know if that would work or not as I don't go watching the weather forecast as there is nothing I can do about it anyway.

Don-Wi · Jun 12, 2015

I cut some on Monday that good trained on good that night which is never a concern the day it was cut. We raked it Wednesday planning to bale on Thursday, with the rain that was supposed to start around 3-7pm. I was getting wagons around yesterday morning when it started dripping, and it finally quit raining sometime this morning.

Good news is,I have one guy who still wants to buy a load straight from the field once we get it dry, and he said he'd still pay the agreed upon price.

Donovan from Wisconsin

Pair-a-dice farm · Jun 12, 2015

I cut hay Monday in a light rain. The weather guessers were calling for 4 days of 40% or more rain chance. I baled 89 rolls Wednesday, the dewpoint was low and the sun high. We still haven't got any rain this week. I'd say the old guy may have learned a lesson years ago.

I look at the global satellite and try to predict it myself. I usually guess as good ad the ones that get paid.

hrRoss · Jun 13, 2015

hay wont dry standing up! i have many times in the past cut hay before a rain. experts said years ago the rain washes off the waxy coating on the stems so it will dry faster after getting rained on. it works

North Vale - PA · Jun 13, 2015

I'm in SE PA, and we have a few things to deal with. First off, we are close enough to the beaches that any weather reports leading up to the weekend tend to be overly
optimistic. I use to hear rain predictions given in percent chance, and experience said 30% and less would miss me. Now, they say "widely scattered", "chance of t-
storms", etc. No numbers. The second thing is the mountains 50 miles to our west. Really affects the path of t-storms and they become very un-predictable. So, rain front
forecasts tend to be accurate, t-storm forecasts are a crap shoot.

One Sunny Day Does Not Make Hay

showcrop

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Lazy WP

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Carlyle hoffman

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K Effective

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Anonymous-0

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paul

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RayP(MI)

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Dave H (MI)

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rrlund

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Richard L

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Don-Wi

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Pair-a-dice farm

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hrRoss

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North Vale - PA

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