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Kids now days really don't want that type of work. Got one neighbor that pay $10 hr cash and has a hard time getting help. That pay includes the fried chicken dinner too. He usually has grownups for helpers.
 
I ran away from College at one point and spent a summer working on a Dairy farm. Had a job making molding, working a split shift. When I wasn't doing that, I was baling hay or helping to milk the cows. When I wasn't doing that, I was getting into trouble.

That summer convinced me that as much fun as farming is, I really needed to go back to school, get my degree, and get a job where I wasn't looking at the south end of a northbound cow all the time....

But I seriously did like baling hay. Something about the hard work, being outside, the smell of the hay, and the way I've never had a better tasting beer than the first one after a long day of baling... :thumb:
 
Rob, I do have facts and figures. I crunch numbers a lot. Even though it hasn't proven to make me much money, I do tend to put a couple thousand ahead each year, my problem, we are first generation farmers thus we have land debt. The second generation if they choose to come to the farm and work it will enjoy the ability to "tweak" not build from scratch all the fences, gateways, chutes/alleys, feedbunks, driveways, lean to's, etc. Believe it or not, if I don't charge myself my costs, I can feed the brood cows for what it would cost me to purchase feeder calves in the spring. My labor being considered free does create a savings though. Very very seldom will you purchase livestock of any type from a salebarn and not bring some disease home to the herd. So raising my own calves, their health is a direct reflection of my abilities or lack thereof. It is frustrating as tonight was, spent all day in the city with Lou Ann getting surgery and MRI's, then get home, get her settled, go feed, start with a calf we bought off of Craig's list so he is in a pen in the barn by himself, he will get put in with the weaned calves in a couple of weeks when they come into his pen. (I am not against buying calves, prefer off of the farm) Then put wood in the woodstove, ran water to the cows trough while doing this and feeding the cats, chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys. Okay, then shut off the water, went to the horsebarn, started water in the pony trough, fed them their hay, went to the other side of the barn, fed hay to the team in training and the two old saddle horses. Changed the hose from the pony trough to the team's trough. Got the Oliver and moved a round bale under the lean to for feeding to the horses, shut off water, took a round bale to the cows, tractor ran out of gas. Put gas in, finished that job, put tractor up, (water pump is still leaking, need to get it changed soon). So the reason for the tumblebug is now known, tractor will be down for who knows how long. Needed an alternative method to getting the round bales in to the cows. The new team is to green to move a bale onto a mudboat let alone drag a mudboat into a cattle pasture full of cows crowding them. Dark, pitch dark, darker than the inside of a boot before I get done. Oh well, same color of day that I do chores in the morning. Just mentally and physically tired today. Tomorrow will be better, get up, do chores, start the bus, go in and get changed and check on Lou, if she feels good, I will stay at school, if not, will drive bus route and come home. If I stay at school, will teach then drive route home, get home by 3:45 then be out doing chores by 4 then in if all goes well by 6. That is without seeing the shop or any maintenance or working with the team. No complaints mind you, it raised my two girls to appreciate good honest work, family time working together and playing together. Concerning the hay situation/labor, number one reason for round bales being baled, lack of labor force. Kids don't want to/can't work. Football and basketball are year round sports anymore. Coaches want the kids in the weight room when it isn't the season, but don't want them working hayfields, wrong muscles I guess. Will try to put together some information on how our small square bales are handled around here now.
Pretty much same market, cattle, fuel, cereal all compete for the grain.
 
We will start Rob with a hayfield ready to cut. Here is an address for pictures of what I call windrowers or conditioners. The reason, it cuts and places in a windrow the cut hay (so it dries quicker). Conditioner because it cuts the plant then runs it through two rollers that are close together causing the hay to be "crimped" as the rollers have grooves and bumps thus crimping the stem helping dry time be reduced.

http://www.google.com/images?q=Mowe...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=2&ved=0CCwQsAQwAQ

Next in a day or so depending on humidity, thickness of the crop it needs to be flipped (raked) so the bottom gets dry also. There are many many styles of rakes but here are a few.

http://www.google.com/images?q=Hay+...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=2&ved=0CDAQsAQwAQ

Now you have your hay crop cut/windrowed, raked and it rains or it isn't drying properly. Then you need to spread it out in a thin layer to get it aired out so it dries properly. But you have it windrowed or raked already. So, another tool is needed. A tedder. Here you see some, they take those straight or crooked rows of hay and spread them out like a sheet over a bed.

http://www.google.com/images?q=Tedd...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=3&ved=0CC4QsAQwAg

Then when the desired dryness is obtained, you get back in the field and rake the hay crop back into rows so it can be fed into the baler in a somewhat precise rate creating equal bales of density and size.

Here are some round balers:
http://www.google.com/images?q=Roun...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=3&ved=0CC8QsAQwAg

Here are some big square balers: These can produce bales from 400 to 2000 pounds per bale.

http://www.google.com/images?q=big+...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=2&ved=0CCYQsAQwAQ

Here are some small square balers:
http://www.google.com/images?q=smal...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=3&ved=0CC4QsAQwAg

Small square bales are the most labor intensive bales to produce. Their claim to fame was stackability. Large rounds have to much air space and move on trailers. The big squares have really changed the hay market making it more global instead of local. Small squares are most convenient for storage, handling, feeding, etc. So to combat the loss of available labor a few more tools have developed. First up, an accumulator. Just what the name implies. It accumulates bales instead of dropping them one at a time hodge podge around the field. As the pictures show, there are many styles, also accumulators for large square bales as well as small square bales.

http://www.google.com/images?oe=utf...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=3&ved=0CDEQsAQwAg

We get these small square bales accumulated, we want a way to pick them up. So we need a grabber. Again many styles, most popular seems to be a squeeze or hook designs.

http://www.google.com/images?q=bale...esult_group&ct=title&resnum=2&ved=0CCQQsAQwAQ

Now each and every pass on good alfalfa (which I don't prefer or feed to my stock) you the farmer lose leaves (protein/profit/tdn). So the fewer passes/handling passes are preferred. What if it isn't quite dry enough, but is close, and it is going to rain. Propionic acid. More equipment needed on your baler, it is like an insurance policy. Also very hard on the metal of your equipment. Here is a good article.

http://hayandforage.com/other/custom-forage-harvesting/0401-using-propionic-acid/

Okay, your hay is in the barn now for winter Rob. I am taking the bull back sometime this week. Hope all cows are settled, will be weaning calves soon, gearing up for slowing down for winter! :doh::rofl::rofl::thumb::thumb: Bet your sorry you asked! :wave:
 
Wow I read the first of this post and was trying to remeber the old tumble bug having wheels and grandpa's didn't. Read some more and figured it out. The tumble bug I was thinking of was for hauling dirt. As I continued to read it brought back a lot of memories. In the mid to late 60's we customed small square baled for a neighbor. The price was .11 a bale. $.10 for the baler and dad got a penny to load on the rack. I have no idea what the guys got that unloaded and stacked in the mow. It is hard to beat the smell of fresh hay. We grew clover at the time because our ground was so poor it wouldn't grow alfalfa. The bumble bees liked the clover and hardly a year would go by without getting stung a couple of times. We would dab a little gas on the sting and go on. The gas seemed to take the burn out of the sting. We later had a diesel tractor but the diesel fuel on the sting didn't work as well as gas. We also would dip our arms in the stock tank the cool off and get the hay chaff off them.
 
Jonathan
I think you and Steve have farm-level ag economics pretty much nailed on the head, right down to the micro-choices about where you put your resources (land, labour, capital and, of course, time) every day.
I gave a lecture to the first-year technician class (our future farmers) at the ag college a couple of weeks ago, mostly on marketing - the other end of the process. That group could sure use a regular dose of your common sense approach!:thumb:
Of course, we'll have to see what sort of grade Rob gets on the exam before we pass final judgement on your teaching skills!:D

I hope I get a chance to make a farm call at your place sometime!

All the best
Peter
 
:wave::clap::clap::clap::clap::score:

Thanks Jonathan for all that effort. I cannot tell you how much i appreciate it.

The very first things that came to mind for me were,

  • capital intensive
  • time to process a field and time it takes to make hay
  • risk of loss .....storm, wind,pests, poor health impacting ones own labor capacity
  • gas/diesel costs
  • maintenance costs even if its only parts.
  • return????
  • economies of scale needed
All of the above just to get to the point where one has feed. Thats beside the next stage of feeding and raising the animal whatever it may be.

Is the silage process any more efficient given that the crop of feed goes into a silo for fermentation?

I am going to get my son to sit and look at this thread because he has farmers at his school. They play football together and he needs to understand even a little of their lives. He is way to wiseguy for my liking and needs a little humbling either through reading and awareness or my old school way.

I have no idea if there is such a thing, but we are in the week of Remembrance Day, but the thought also struck me that we could really do with a Farmers day when people just stop and give some thought to that cereal, bacon and egg or steak and milk they so easily pick up and reliably find at the store. Yeah i know its mass produced now on big farms but it still dont mean we have to take it for granted. Which is 100% of what the people i know do.


John it also hit me that a small medium size farmer suffers the same as the small business man and in fact has to be somewhat more astute than many a small businesman i have met.


Think about all the hats you have to wear.
  • Finance/Accounting
    • Keeping accounts and measurements and continuous review of budget vs actual.
    • Provisions for the what if scenario.
    • Deciding on capital investment and return.
    • Managing cashflow
  • Marketing & Sales
    • Man this list is long
  • Operations
    • Production
    • Maintenance
    • Process Engineering
  • General Manager
The thing that strikes me is that you guys dont have place for error.

But a retailers life is somewhat very similar except certain ones have a bigger risk. As i say to my wife, who works in the insurance game, she has legislated job security in Canada because you cannot drive without insurance.

In a similar way people may stop shopping for say durable goods or nice to haves which impact the retailer and the factory that produces goods, but one thing for sure they have to eat.

So the positive side to farming is the demand. Only problem is the price point is set by economies of scale and mass production.

John when i see the sequence you go through in terms of feeding and watering i wondered how many can actually work a routine like that.

I tried to get people back home in our factory to use two hands when doing assembly. Boy it was near impossible. But in Denmark i visited a telephone manufacturer and the ladies there were totally using two hands and all day long. Go figure why they could earn more.

Hey you thought of putting some degree of automation into your place. I am thinking floating ball valves like on the toilets on the drinking troughs. But i suppose with winter here its not an option given pipe freeze?

BTW i think you have just given me an interetsing idea to create a presentation to get the point across of needing to attend to more than just sales or staff in small business. It often helps me to use a analogy that is not related to the business type the person is involved in.

I do think there is no way one could survive being a farmer of any type if you are not at all technically inclined.

Although the job brings loads of physical work, its way more than that. Its got a nice amount of variety. To me it sure would beat sitting behind a computer like many of us do for so many hours. We nothing more than your cows in a roundabout sort of way.

Good luck on the tractor John. Hope you pull it off quicker than you think. Somehow i guess thats never the case.

Regards to Lou hope things are getting better with her.:thumb:

Lots to think about here. Thanks for staying on the farm.:thumb::thumb: Know from me that i appreciate the effort a farmer goes to in producing my food.
 
Rob, Rob, Rob, you are over thinking it again. (Take that as a joke please.) If I would show what you wrote to most of the local farmers around here, they would pack it all up. They have no idea how many hats they wear. It is just something you do and not think about.

Farmers have no idea why they shop at the Dollar Store and not Macy's on 5th ave. They just know they need to save dollars for that emergency/ raining day fund. My father in law bought a new truck in 2005, he wanted one for his retirement gift for myself. I had no idea you could buy a truck with so few options. As stripped as it is I was surprised it had a motor:D. When I bought my only new truck it had 5 options, I didn't even notice, until it was point out. Just the way we think.

A fancy house makes you no money, a barn does. A fancy truck makes no money, the stuff in the trailer it pulls does. I think you already get the point. Spend money, but spend it very wisely.
 
An old bull breeder/raiser/renter told me once long ago, "it isn't what you make, it is what you spend".

You make good points Rob, yes using analogies from other walks of life create thinking and are great ways to cross reference what it is you are trying to make a point of.

I think all efficient people wear more hats than they think of. It is a matter of doing things with common sense and in a responsible manner. At school, I shudder to think of the umbrella of hats I wear.
 
My neighbor has a long pole attachement on the front of his tractor...like the one they use in carpet stores to move the rolls of carpet... he picks up his round bales with that, loads them onto his flatbed trailer.... he can load/tow about 10 bales on that trailer. I don't know how many cows he's feeding as I don't know all of his pastures... the one next to my house, in front of his... is about 20-30 acres (just guessing) and has maybe 30 head of cattle and calves... during the summer and spring when grass is good, he doesn't put out hay, but now that fall is here, he'll be feeding more hay. On a summer day you can sit on the front porch and hear the cows munching on the grass about 30 yards away. Last spring he had two calves that were not fazed by the electric fence... they would duck under it, take the shock and eat in my garden which is along side his driveway and just across the driveway from his pasture.

Steve,
I just re-read your post about the new truck your FIL bought... I guess that would explain my father's preference in his trucks... he left the farm in the late '50's... not because he wanted to, but from necessity.. He and mom were divorced and he was living there alone.. he made more money doing carpentry work, etc.... but he never gave up the farmer mentality I guess... when he finally was able to get a pick up it was as stripped as you could get... I think the only option on it was the radio and a cigarette lighter. He didn't like automatic transmissions so the first one was a standard 3 speed on the column.... when he got the second one - about 10 years later.. the first one had a hole in the floorboard you could throw a 20 lbs cat through... his wife picked out the truck and it came with an automatic transmission - so she could drive it too - he always made derogatory comments about that "one legged man's truck".... he kept the older one and drove it more than the new one. The hole in the floor was a convenience for him to dispose of his cigarette butts.
 
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