Baling over 2,000 Acres of Oat Hay

The beginning of this year held a little bit of change for us as Justin switched jobs and began working for the same farmer as his brother, Jaylon.  Paul is a very nice boss and Justin really likes working for him.  

This spring held some long hours for Justin and Jaylon as they swathed and baled over 2,000 acres of oat hay.  In the winter, after harvest is over and the fields have been disked, they spread oat seed as a cover crop.  Come springtime they swath the oat fields and then comes the long nights of baling.  They have to bale at night so there is a little bit of moisture in the bales.

Benaiah and I went to ride with Justin in the swather a few times.

After the oats are cut and baled they plant corn into the oat stubble.  The pivots are started and the corn begins to grow!  The oat stubble acts as a "straw" and carries the water down into the soil for the corn seed.

When you bale over 14,000 bales, a lot of twine is used!  They use this much almost every night!

 Those all-nighters in the tractor baling can get pretty long so Benaiah and I went to ride with Justin a few times.

Benaiah just sleeps the night away on a little blanket bed on the floor...

Once they finish baling a field (120 acres) there are about 1,000 bales to pick up and stack before the corn seed can be planted.  They had a nifty machine called a Milstak that they drove around and it picked up the bale and placed it on the bed.  After they had their load of 12 bales they drove to the edge of the field and the bed tipped up to stack them.  

If you're wondering why I keep talking about the Milstak in past tense it's because it burnt to the ground in the middle of baling season.  

Neither Jaylon or Justin were responsible for this accident.

Within less than a week after the fire, another Milstak had been ordered.  In the meantime before it arrived, Justin and Jaylon had to pick up bales with a loader, truck, and trailer.

One morning Benaiah and I went to ride with Justin in the semi while he drove around and Jaylon loaded the trailer.

The new Milstak arrived and was put to work right away.  This one you pull behind a tractor but it does the same job as the self propelled Milstak.

Here's a little video to give you a better idea of how the Milstak works.

The rocking of the tractor puts Benaiah right to sleep...

 Benaiah loves to go visit his daddy at work!!

(Don't worry, the tractor was parked and shut off :)

Notice the huge stack of bales in the background!  They usually have a stack like this in each pivot corner.