This year

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Here it's a fight to find a window to cut it and get it dry. Not usually a Wyoming problem. Still green here end of June when we are usually starting to cure grasses out so we can do fire season in August. Might stay green all summer. Should be a fair amount of bleached out cow hay for sale this year.
 
Overall we are running about 3/4 normal production. Some fields close to normal, mixed grasses are shorter. Still have some over mature 1st cutting to do but it turned humid and threats of showers with some hard rain the first of the week real close. Cut another 20 +acres Tuesday and raked it Wed eve and dry baled it Thursday eve in anticipation of severe threat this afternoon... nothing.... Oh well... Still got another 50 to make.... 2nd cutting orchard grass is looking real good after that 3.5 in rains a week ago, but we will need more to keep it coming on...
Take it as it comes. We should be okay for hay as son put up a hay shed and it will save alot of lost hay on the outside of rolls that are stored outside... still have alot stored outside, but will have alot inside too...
 
Still early UP here but the 60 acres I've got done it running about 60% of usual. Only laid down about 20 acres today because the 4 day forecast is only showing high temps in the 60s so drying will be a struggle. But it too looks to be 50-60% of usual. No rain and 90 degree temps in May and June are taking their toll.
 
chevytaHOE5674 said:
Still early UP here but the 60 acres I've got done it running about 60% of usual. Only laid down about 20 acres today because the 4 day forecast is only showing high temps in the 60s so drying will be a struggle. But it too looks to be 50-60% of usual. No rain and 90 degree temps in May and June are taking their toll.
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The UP is such a wild place.
 
I made plenty hay. Just a quality issue. Wasn't able to get it cut till May 22.

Clover/ryegrass tested 11.3%, Bermuda/ryegrass tested 6.8%. ADF was 47 and 43.5.
 
1982vett said:
I made plenty hay. Just a quality issue. Wasn't able to get it cut till May 22.

Clover/ryegrass tested 11.3%, Bermuda/ryegrass tested 6.8%. ADF was 47 and 43.5.
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I can satisfy their protein needs out of a sack if I have too.
There is six cows and a bull on pasture that carried 35 pairs for years. I have plenty of grass, I should go buy some SS heavies but I'm not.
 
Saw some 1st cut down yesterday that had got a bunch of rain on it. Giving rain every day the next 2 weeks. No clue what weather they were watching when they cut it.

As scarce as hay is and as dry as its been all spring...was a heavy yielding field for here this year.
 
ClinchValley86 said:
Saw some 1st cut down yesterday that had got a bunch of rain on it. Giving rain every day the next 2 weeks. No clue what weather they were watching when they cut it.

As scarce as hay is and as dry as its been all spring...was a heavy yielding field for here this year.
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Gonna be a lot of cows leave this area or get mighty thin this winter.
 
kenny thomas said:
Gonna be a lot of cows leave this area or get mighty thin this winter.
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You got that right. Not sure what folks gonna do.

Many on my side of the mountain are only yielding about half their normal amount. Many haven't even taken 1st cut yet, gonna be some rank low Q stuff when they finally do. That'll make em thin too.

You seen many fields yet to be cut? I understand their logic, but don't agree with it. Get it off the field and let it have another attempt. Kind of shot themselves in the foot I feel like. Crabgrass and other warm season stuff needs that sunlight.
 
ClinchValley86 said:
You got that right. Not sure what folks gonna do.

Many on my side of the mountain are only yielding about half their normal amount. Many haven't even taken 1st cut yet, gonna be some rank low Q stuff when they finally do. That'll make em thin too.

You seen many fields yet to be cut? I understand their logic, but don't agree with it. Get it off the field and let it have another attempt. Kind of shot themselves in the foot I feel like. Crabgrass and other warm season stuff needs that sunlight.
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Most hay here was cut in mid May and its coming back but still slow.
Im going to look at my hay numbers, stockpile quality, and then sell cows to match up to the forage i have.
 
Caustic Burno said:
I can satisfy their protein needs out of a sack if I have too.
There is six cows and a bull on pasture that carried 35 pairs for years. I have plenty of grass, I should go buy some SS heavies but I'm not.
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Just not feeling it anymore? I guess I'm glad for you in a way. After we sold out the one place my grandad lived on we thought hunting and fishing full time would be enough to keep him going, guess it wasn't because he made it about 6 years and only 5 on his feet. You don't look very old in your photos but I guess I'd figure you at 65-70.

Some folks can come up with enough fun stuff to do in order to keep moving all the time and stay forked-end down and some can't. After he retired from large livestock, my grandfather was only seen to move real fast again one time. He was sitting on the porch with a coffee and a cigar and a pair of loose pitbulls started raiding my sister's chicken coops and rabbit hutches.

To hear the description from the neighbor that has line of sight on the property:
"He moved faster than I'd ever seen him move, he was in the house and back out with a shotgun in seconds. He hobbled down the hill, and he killed the first dog. By the time that one was on the ground he'd swung on the next one and killed it, laid it out flat dead"

He then told the neighbors (who had come to the commotion) that my sister would be getting off of the bus soon and she shouldn't have to see this, so by himself he at 74 yoinked up these two pitbulls, bagged them in contractor bags and stuffed them in a county can at the end of the drive and was back on the porch with a coffee and cigar when she got off the bus.

You'd have loved the old man, Caustic, ran a Model 12 with a US stamp that would always throw 1 1BK at 100 yards into a pie tin and would keep most on the plate at 50. Ran dogs on deer, rabbits, squirrels and coon and brought me up doing the same. He killed somewhere between 300-500 deer in his life, around 150-250 turkeys, and he lived like an absolute king unherded by nobody and by his own rules.
 
I talked to a man who bought alfalfa for $150 a ton last week. He told me that the export guys gave the hay growers 10% ended up walking away. So there is a lot of perfectly good last year hay around. I know of one place which has 8 or 10 pivots. Last years hay still in the stacks and first cutting this years hay stacked beside it. There is a lot of hay that get rained on the last two weeks. This week I have probably drove by a couple of thousand acres of rained on hay. So there will be a lot of bleached out cow hay available this year along with last year alfalfa.
I also saw 3 or 4 pivot of corn that looks like it was frosted. I have no idea how long or if ever it will take that corn to recover. Some of it looks to be 3/4 dead. Others it is just the tops of the plants dead with green down low. On June 20 it was 33 degrees here in the morning. Where that corn is the elevation is 800/900 feet higher so I am sure it got below freezing.
 
Turned out our timing was perfect. Baleage - mowed June 8 & 9th - baled 10th & 11th. Got about 55-60% of normal. The 11th evening started raining. Got 2" in 12 hours. Couple days later got 1.5" 2 days in a row. Been scattered showers pretty much daily since. 2nd cutting is looking GREAT!
 
Jeanne - Simme Valley said:
Turned out our timing was perfect. Baleage - mowed June 8 & 9th - baled 10th & 11th. Got about 55-60% of normal. The 11th evening started raining. Got 2" in 12 hours. Couple days later got 1.5" 2 days in a row. Been scattered showers pretty much daily since. 2nd cutting is looking GREAT!
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Glad to hear it. We just might have a decent 3rd that'll cushion the first cut blow.

I've put my name on some 2nd cut hay at $40 a roll. I figure that's about $120 a ton before dragging it home. Probably won't need the amount I spoke for but should be able to resell it no problem by end of winter. He may regret pricing it so far in advance too.
 
50/50Farms said:
Just not feeling it anymore? I guess I'm glad for you in a way. After we sold out the one place my grandad lived on we thought hunting and fishing full time would be enough to keep him going, guess it wasn't because he made it about 6 years and only 5 on his feet. You don't look very old in your photos but I guess I'd figure you at 65-70.

Some folks can come up with enough fun stuff to do in order to keep moving all the time and stay forked-end down and some can't. After he retired from large livestock, my grandfather was only seen to move real fast again one time. He was sitting on the porch with a coffee and a cigar and a pair of loose pitbulls started raiding my sister's chicken coops and rabbit hutches.

To hear the description from the neighbor that has line of sight on the property:
"He moved faster than I'd ever seen him move, he was in the house and back out with a shotgun in seconds. He hobbled down the hill, and he killed the first dog. By the time that one was on the ground he'd swung on the next one and killed it, laid it out flat dead"

He then told the neighbors (who had come to the commotion) that my sister would be getting off of the bus soon and she shouldn't have to see this, so by himself he at 74 yoinked up these two pitbulls, bagged them in contractor bags and stuffed them in a county can at the end of the drive and was back on the porch with a coffee and cigar when she got off the bus.

You'd have loved the old man, Caustic, ran a Model 12 with a US stamp that would always throw 1 1BK at 100 yards into a pie tin and would keep most on the plate at 50. Ran dogs on deer, rabbits, squirrels and coon and brought me up doing the same. He killed somewhere between 300-500 deer in his life, around 150-250 turkeys, and he lived like an absolute king unherded by nobody and by his own rules.
Click to expand...
I know I have limited number of fishing trips and hunts.
I am not trying to preserve myself, my goal is to slide to the grave completely wore out and when the kids write the final check it bounces.
Seriously with ankylosis spondylitis things are not going to get easier so I am enjoying them while I can. You can't outrun what your momma gives you.
 

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