(800) 853-2651
SHOP NOW

How does one man do hay operation?

R

relaurain

Member
Has to do with tractor a little:
One man drives tractor pulling baler with kicker/thrower tossing bales in to the catcher wagon, wagon full, man pulls in to barn. Ok, how does one man unload catcher wagon and stack the hay in the barn? Just toss them over the side and then get down and stack? If so, would they be falling apart by now with all the banging?
 
My neighbor milks 30 cows and puts up all his hay alone. He has three thrower wagons that he loads in the afternoon, then milks cows, then unloads them. He has an elevator running along the peak of the barn. He puts them on an elevator outside, that takes it up to the one along the peak, they drop off in the barn. He then goes up and stacks them, and moves on to the next load, so on and so on..... Pretty darn good for a man 60+ years old. Has farmed with two cylinder Deere's as long as I can remember.
 
How does he put them on the elevator when they are in the wagon? Is the elecator set high as the wagon so he is still in the wagon?
 
Hay farmer down the road does all the field work himself. He uses a baler with thrower,7 wagons,2 rakes and 2 tedders,discbine and 5 tractors.He will stack it but usually calls for help.He sells alot right off the wagons.Lot of work when the weather is right for one man.
Vito
 
Yep, End of the elevator sits on a wooden stand that places the elevator about 18 inches higher than the wagon floor. The fronts of the wagons drop down like a tailgate on a pickup and he stands on that and sets the bales on the elevator. After it's half empty, he pulls the wagon forward and unloads the back half out the side doors of the thrower wagon.
 
I don't have a thrower on my baler, or a catcher wagon, they drop out of the old 69 new holland onto the ground. After I'm done I fire up the ford ranger, load 25 bales and head for the shed. Its on the hay property, unload and head back for more, I like working by my self, last summer I baled, hauled and stacked 22 hundred, I work at my own speed, nobody saying hurry up.
 
Mow, ted, rake, bale into kicker wagons. Unload wagon onto an elevator into the barn. Run off a pile, go into barn and stack bales. Run off another pile go in and stack. For the last hay of the season, bale into kicker wagons stopping frequently to stack them in the wagon then park the wagons in the barn and either sell or feed off from the wagons.
It's a slow way to do hay but if you don't have a lot it gets it done.
Or do round or big squares.
 
Yep, and when he is done unloading just one tandem wagon, he will have sweat running from places he never knew he had.
 
(quoted from post at 21:48:29 01/26/09) My neighbor milks 30 cows and puts up all his hay alone. He has three thrower wagons that he loads in the afternoon, then milks cows, then unloads them. He has an elevator running along the peak of the barn. He puts them on an elevator outside, that takes it up to the one along the peak, they drop off in the barn. He then goes up and stacks them, and moves on to the next load, so on and so on..... Pretty darn good for a man 60+ years old. Has farmed with two cylinder Deere's as long as I can remember.
Click to expand...

:) I knew another farmer that hayed exactly the same as you've described. He skipped the part about going up in the barn and stacking! He just let them pile up the same as they would in the wagons! He was just feeding his own animals so it didn't matter if the bales ended up a little mis-shapen or occasionally broken! :roll: :shock: Rob, your dad used to work for him! :lol: :lol:
Dave 8)
 
I do all my own, don't have a kicker, just make long straight windrows, make as many bales as I can before one falls off the wagon. Stop, stack what's there, continue on. My field is only 750' long, 400' wide so I make alot of stops. When at the barn, I unload until the elevator can't dump out of the way. I then go up and stack them and then continue. IF I can get any help, it shortens the cycle but the end result is the same. My wife is going to retire this comming spring after 45 years as a RN, I don't think she knows what is going to happen. John
 
I did 8300 square bales last summer myself. I bale on the ground (even tho I have a kicker baler & wagons-tough to unload them yourself). Haul 53 on my 8-ft bed pick-up truck. Can load 53 without getting off the ground, so loading the truck is a breeze. Unloading in the barns is a different story. I keep the alleyway kind of empty (toss bales up in mows on non bale day). Can handle up to 500 a day. 300 is a nice workout. I'm 65 years young. Do the mowing for tomorrow, ted today's field if necessary; rake it; quick sandwitch & tea; bale; drink & head out with the pickup. If rain is pushing me, can do two truckloads per hour. Many long days. Beer & a banana & shower about dark-maybe a little later. Last year 12,000. Also 200 rounds. My saving grace-I have a tractor for the discbine, one on the tedder; one for the rake, one always hooked to the square baler, one always hooked to the round baler, one with a loader, All old like me-I guess the new one is a 1975.
 
While I try not to do a one man band, I have before. In a sense the guy that works for me is. I used to dump in the driveway of a pole barn with a NH bale wagon. Hired a guy to come in at night and stack the hay into the side sheds. I could drop 5000 in the driveways before I had to go back and dump again. He'd usually stay a barn ahead of me.

After I sold the bale wagon, guy that works for me stacks the wagon behind the baler. Then the next morning he unloads and stacks the hay in the barn, just him. With my legs shot, I cant handle square bales any more. He usually gets 450 unloaded and into the barn before the dew has burned off enough to bale. Thats the way I used to do it before I got hurt and before I had a regular employee.
 
Some guys had hoists on their thrower wagons and a tailgate that opened. They'd lock the tailgate open just enough to get bales out and hoist the wagon up and stand there with two long bale hooks lining up the bales in the elevator. Lee
 
One of my neighbor's is in his 80's, and he bales 15 acres of hay of his own, and custom bales for neighbors. He has very nice equipment, a new baler, jd, and a couple of 80's or early 90's tractors. Also a newer mower - disc or drum? It maybe a haybine too, haven't seen him mow. And 4 big hay wagons - ez trails. I have never seen him touch a bale. I bought hay from him, towed his wagon to my place, unloaded it, and took it back. He has a barn big enough to put everything in. Old guy retired from GM, still lives in the house he was born in, buried his mother, sister and father over the years. Never been married. He told me the only time he ever left Michigan was when he was drafted in ww2. Nice guy. His equipment all looks like new.
 
You can do it but if you are like me, your back hurting like heck will make you want $50 a bale when you are done and you won't sell any bales at that price. My advise is get some good young help!. Local high school football players are a good place to look!
 
I hayed about 20 or so acres when I was in the Idaho panhandle. I had an old IH 275 swather with no oil pressure. I had a JD 346 baler that finally did a decent job after replacing the knotters and properly timing it. I had an old New Holland (oximoron?) bale wagon I picked the bales up with. It really didn't stack very well, so I still had to hand stack. I finally got tired of doing all that, and sold the hay to a guy that was getting government subsidies not to grow hay. He made more money buying my hay from the check he got from the government.. figure that one out..
 
(reply to post at 02:42:24 01/27/09)
Click to expand...
I helped my neighbor bale his hay for the last 10 years. He would do all the prep work,and I would just stack the bales on the wagon and keep the equipment repaired. The wagon holds 200 bales and that is what he would try to mow for each day. He would unload and mowe the hay by himself. This winter he asked me to take over the operation now that I am retired. His legs hurt to much to do it anymore. He just turned 87 years old. No doctor, no meds, never married, lives by himself. A very nice guy.
 
I have a homemade "Bale Basket" that I run right behind the baler. It holds around 12-15 bales (depends on the hay). When it's full, I pull a rope and it dumps on the ground. From there it's easy to either pickup with the tractor or load onto a hayrack. Then unload in the barn. A good "bale-a-vator" will help, even if you're not putting them in the loft.
Even with my bad back, hips, knees, shoulders, etc, my wife and I can get several hundred a day stacked in the barn - just not all at once.
Neighbor used a bale accumulator that stacked them in piles of 10. He'd then use a "Bale Squeeze" on his tractor loader to stack them on the racks, and then into the barn. He would do over 1200 bales a day that way.
 
Does anyone remember putting up loose hay in a
hayloft?
Horses pulling a wagon with a hay loader behind
(you still sometimes see them abandened at the
edge of fields-i"ll bet kids don"t even know what
they are)Horses backing the wagen into the loft
of a hillside barn. A big grapple to grab the
hay, a small boy leading one huge gentle work
horse to pull the grapple up to the top of the
barn, and a trolly to take the loose hay load
to the proper spot to dump it with the pull on
another rope. Yes it"s somewhat easier now, but
so much of family working togather farm life of
my youth has been lost.
 
I have been baling hay all by myself for years. I let four or five bales push up on the wagon, get off and stack the bales and go again. When the wagon is full get another wagon and do the same. I bale only two loads a day at the most and unload after dark when it is cooler. At one time I could bale more but after 70 I slowed down a bit. I cash rent the farm and just have 4 acres of hay here at the house for the horses. I started custom baling as a kid and have always looked at it as a fun thing to do in the summer.
 
I don't remember doing the "hay loft" hay thing, but I rode along with a friend to an old farmstead that he had inherited from his great uncles. He went to retrieve some things from the place after he had sold it. Anyway, there was an old hay wagon that was along side the barn with some very, very old hay on it. No one seemed to know the entire story behind what had happened, but they did know that it had been there since the late 1940's. It just looked like the wagon had been parked there at lunchtime, and they started to unload it, went to eat lunch and never got back to it. Part of the load is still on it!!! The place was was still a working ranch until about 5 years ago.
 
I cut hay for a village operated "late 1800's farm. I cut, ted, and rake and they pick up and put in the barn exactly as You said greygoat.
 
Yes I remember the hayloft but we didnt have a wagon used a two horse sled and tossed the hay into the loft from the sled. I don't remember it being mutch fun.
 
I was three when Dad sold the horses but still made loose hay until I was eight. Dad used slings rather than the hay fork to lift the hay from the wagon. Worked the same way just bigger loads off the wagon at one time.
 
I used a baler and thrower wagons, built two hay conveyors. The one outside of the barn was on pipes anchored in concrete, about 4 feet off the ground. Unloaded via side doors in the wagons. Haymow conveyor I built with an adjustable tip-off, slid along the length of the conveyor, tipped to either side. Bales dropped 20 feet to the floor- none broke, pile built up. Only stacking was near the top, sometimes hired help for that.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

J
What implements for hay are you guys using for higher volume?
2
Replies
31
Views
1K
showcrop
showcrop
WI Dan
Hay transporting (similar to previous topic)
Replies
7
Views
440
WI Dan
WI Dan
D
Hay wagon: 1 or 3 sides?
2
Replies
23
Views
2K
wildwes
W
Tgrasher
I've been doing it backwards
Replies
11
Views
611
J Hamilton
J Hamilton
B
Baling loose hay
Replies
5
Views
271
BarnyardEngineering
BarnyardEngineering
Tractor Parts Tractor Manuals

We sell tractor parts! We have the parts you need to repair your tractor - the right parts. Our low prices and years of research make us your best choice when you need parts. Shop Online Today.

Copyright © 1997-2024 Yesterday's Tractor Co.

All Rights Reserved. Reproduction of any part of this website, including design and content, without written permission is strictly prohibited. Trade Marks and Trade Names contained and used in this Website are those of others, and are used in this Website in a descriptive sense to refer to the products of others. Use of this Web site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy TRADEMARK DISCLAIMER: Tradenames and Trademarks referred to within Yesterday's Tractor Co. products and within the Yesterday's Tractor Co. websites are the property of their respective trademark holders. None of these trademark holders are affiliated with Yesterday's Tractor Co., our products, or our website nor are we sponsored by them. John Deere and its logos are the registered trademarks of the John Deere Corporation. Agco, Agco Allis, White, Massey Ferguson and their logos are the registered trademarks of AGCO Corporation. Case, Case-IH, Farmall, International Harvester, New Holland and their logos are registered trademarks of CNH Global N.V.

Yesterday's Tractors - Antique Tractor Headquarters
Website Accessibility Policy

Back
Top