Haying, first cutting

[HuskerGLEANER]

We finally have got our first cutting of alfalfa done. It has been extremely late this year kind of like all the other crops and slow going due to the rain almost every other night the last couple weeks of June. Even though it was late, it turned out to be very good even with getting rained on several times.. Anyways, on with the pictures.

This alfalfa has been down for about a week and a half, been rained on atleast 5 times but Saturday afternoon it was finally just dry enough to go. Dad made the first round with the rake and I went to get the 4850 to be ready to move bales.



Then I took over raking.



Dad starting to bale.



Checking the moisture.


Good to go.




On the other half of the pivot the hired hand was putting on liquid nitrogen with the 4955.



Now a few of my favorites...





I took this picture today when I finished up moving the last 60 bales. Like I said it turned out to be a pretty good first cutting because we got about 275 bales off of that half pivot.


Cleared off and got the pivot running but there was a storm brewing to the southwest. Turns out it didn't get us though.


Comments and questions welcome.

[70ds]

Nice pics. For the price people are getting for alfalfa, I would be a good year to have some irrigated alfalfa.

[hoss]

nice pics man thats a pretty good turn out, how many acres was that piece? very nice rake but i have some lit on a nh one and it sounds like it would be easier to just have all the manual stuff on it compared to the hydraulics lol i got confused just reading on it

[koskovichi]

How do you like your rake? I am looking at buying two new ones and i was looking at the vermeers twin rakes

[treymo]

Nice Pictures. We used to have 8 circles of alfalfa. Got rid of the last circle in 05'.
Trey

[70ds]

They just got one of those rakes where my Dad works. He said it is awesome compared to the worn out old wheel rake it replaced.

[koskovichi]

What are average yields down in your area on irrigated hay? Up here in Iowa i average 5 ton an acre alfalfa but we dont irrigate up here

[HuskerGLEANER]

Thanks guys.

Hoss - That half pivot there is just 60 acres. The rake seemed a bit confusing at first with the 3 way hydraulic switch but once I got it hooked up it is extremely easy to operate and set, I wouldn't have it any other way.

koskovichi - That rake is perfect for us. The reason we decided to go with a hydraulic drive over wheel is because we didn't want to run into problems with hay being too heavy for the rake and this hydraulic drive vermeer will rake anything you put infront of it. Based on our old wheel rake and what many people have said is that if you get into heavy alfalfa a wheel rake will either stop turning or just simply jump the windrow and won't rake it because its too heavy. This is our 4th season with the vermeer and its been great for us. I'd have to ask someone about the tonage of alfalfa because im not too familiar with alfalfa yields. Your alfalfa is probably yielding about the same as our irrigated because I don't think we get near the rainfall of you guys over there.

[gmauch]

Jul 6, 2011 0:27:58 GMT -5 HuskerGLEANER said:

koskovichi - That rake is perfect for us. The reason we decided to go with a hydraulic drive over wheel is because we didn't want to run into problems with hay being too heavy for the rake and this hydraulic drive vermeer will rake anything you put infront of it. Based on our old wheel rake and what many people have said is that if you get into heavy alfalfa a wheel rake will either stop turning or just simply jump the windrow and won't rake it because its too heavy. This is our 4th season with the vermeer and its been great for us. I'd have to ask someone about the tonage of alfalfa because im not too familiar with alfalfa yields. Your alfalfa is probably yielding about the same as our irrigated because I don't think we get near the rainfall of you guys over there.

Great pics. We run a pair of Darf wheel rakes and never seen to have that problem. Yesterday we were raking a field that made 2 tons/acre and we were going between 7-9 mph. The one place we have noticed some trouble is rained on hay, but thats usually not that bad.

[jwaldrip]

Hmm, were almost done with our second cutting.

[civicds2]

Do you have window blinds in the cab of that 4440?

[HuskerGLEANER]

Jul 6, 2011 11:36:40 GMT -5 gmauch said:

Jul 6, 2011 0:27:58 GMT -5 HuskerGLEANER said:

koskovichi - That rake is perfect for us. The reason we decided to go with a hydraulic drive over wheel is because we didn't want to run into problems with hay being too heavy for the rake and this hydraulic drive vermeer will rake anything you put infront of it. Based on our old wheel rake and what many people have said is that if you get into heavy alfalfa a wheel rake will either stop turning or just simply jump the windrow and won't rake it because its too heavy. This is our 4th season with the vermeer and its been great for us. I'd have to ask someone about the tonage of alfalfa because im not too familiar with alfalfa yields. Your alfalfa is probably yielding about the same as our irrigated because I don't think we get near the rainfall of you guys over there.

Great pics. We run a pair of Darf wheel rakes and never seen to have that problem. Yesterday we were raking a field that made 2 tons/acre and we were going between 7-9 mph. The one place we have noticed some trouble is rained on hay, but thats usually not that bad.

I have heard Darfs are very good with heavy hay and you can use them at higher speeds, hadn't heard of them until after we bought this one though or I would have looked into one. None of them around this area, kind of wish there were some so I could see one in action!

[HuskerGLEANER]

Jul 6, 2011 22:18:20 GMT -5 civicds2 said:

Do you have window blinds in the cab of that 4440?

Yep, they are actually on the outside of the windows. Personally i find them inconvenient but the old man likes them so they have always been on there.