# New forage farmer needs some help, alot of help



## CanadianHay (Nov 6, 2010)

Hello! I'm new to farming and need alot of basic information on forage equipment, I hope I do not seem too inept, the wife and I are just getting started and well to be honest I'm not sure if the farmers up here have discovered the internet just yet... Even dealers!

We have been trying to make up a budget for some financing and are lacking good information on the equipment package we would need to run a forage farm. Mostly I get conflicting or confusing information and need some clarification.

I will give you what I know, and maybe some of you could correct me and or fill in the holes? Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

We are most likely going to grow grasses, timothy, brome, orchardgrass. Havent decided on alphalfa yet as we plan to grow forage for horses.

And initially we are looking to buy a 100ac hayfield.

I guess the equipment could be seperated into two categories? Tilling/seeding and Harvesting?

Obviously I need one or more tractors with the appropriate HP needed to run the equipment, especially the belt round balers so I have read. So...

1) Tractor

Tilling; the fields? I don not have good infor here... Discing? Harrows?

2) Tilling equipment

Seeding; wow I have been on some dealer websites and seen some expensive pieces of equipment, but they do not really list much info on what they seed for... Drills? Air? I have seem huge contraptions and small lil ride on units. I need some help here.

3) Seeding equipment

4) Fertilizing equipment (Manure spreader the only thing out there???)

Now for harvesting I think I have it fairly figured out except for a question on windrows.

5) Mower/Conditioner

6) Rake

7) Baler

8) Wagon?

MY main question for harvesting is in regards to the conditioners, some seem to imply they cut, condition and windrow all in one... Correct? So I would not need a rake with the proper conditioner?

I have seen some conditioners that do not look like they mow/cut... Or am I wrong here.

I appreciate everyones time for reading my questions! any advise would be great!

Sincerely,
Michael


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## dubltrubl (Jul 19, 2010)

Michael,
First of all, welcome to this forum. It's a great place to learn. I'm fairly new to my own forage endeavor, but have a bit of experience in it from working with others. Keep in mind, my experience is in the South, with mostly bermuda, so it will have limited value to you. Others on here will certainly chime in with more appropriate respones. First of all, I'd be inclined to narrow down on what crop I intend to work with. That will have a large impact on your equipment needs. Then I'd target a market and investigate the demands and needs. Round bales? Small square bales? Large squares? etc. Tillage equipment is not neccessarily a great need unless you have a lot of renovation work to do, or plan on rotating crops. Also, depending on crops, you may be able to get by renting tillage and/or planting equipment. Down in my part of the woods, (Louisiana) many folks don't even use a conditioner for cutting. I know several people that simply use a sickle mower to this day on 100acres or less, so I'd look hard at the benefits/advantage to your operation before purchasing. As for fertilizing, check with your local fertilizer supplier. Most have the equipment on hand to spread fertilizer, and will also provide the service for a small fee. I use this method simply because the cost of speaders vs the usage on my 40 acres just makes sense, They also do a better job speading than I can because they do so much of it. It actually cost me less than $5/ac to have the fertilizer spread after purchase from my local co-op. A great deal in my opinion. As far as a stackwagon, again, depends on what package your planning on. You won't need one if your doing round bales exlusively, but you'll want/need round bale handling equipment instead. Clear as mud now?







Hope some of this hepls.
Steve


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## BCFENCE (Jul 26, 2008)

I dont mean to be to straight forward but do you have any experience in what you are wanting to do. From reading your post from my point of view, it seems like you all just decided this is what you all want to do. The first thing you need to do is gain some exerience in what you want to do , This will save you alot of money and give you valubale knowledge and also awnser alot of your questions you are asking. Im sorry if you take this the wrong way , it was not intended to be harsh.


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## NCSteveH (Jun 30, 2009)

Ok, first I'm going to say this, hay farming ain't easy or cheap.

You will need a rake and also a tedder, you want your windrows spread out and covering as much ground as possible so it dry's down as fast as possible since you are working against mother nature plus if it rains on your windrows you need a way to spread them out to dry again then re-rake them.

It is nice to have dedicated tractors for your harvest implements, only having one tractor will have you questioning your sanity, plus a break-down will sink you if you can't beat the rain.

Don't skimp on buying a baler, spend the money the first time and you won't be buying mid-season what you should have bought in the first place.

Get in good with your neighboring farmers, spending the money for tillage equipment with just 100ac. will not pencil out. you are better off asking you neighbor if you can rent or borrow his disk since you might only need it every 5 years.

You can get a good brillon style seeder for not too much if you look around, make sure it plants on 7" spacing.

Don't forget storage, 100ac can make a lot of hay, with a 2 ton average yield you will end up with 8000 small squares, you can not leave them sitting outside.


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## CanadianHay (Nov 6, 2010)

Thanks for the reply dunltrubl,

Yeah we will most likely try to get some or all of the work done with rentals or neighbors help, the information I need mostly for myself and a budget for a ag loan when we decide to buy machinery and or expand the field. Yeah I am not sure on the mower there seems to be alot of differeing opinions... Balers... my wife wants rounds and squares for the convienence when traveling with the horses so I might end up doing both.

Mostly we just want to have a decent working knowledge of the equipment needed so we can compare prices and work our budget numbers around.

Thanks so much for the advise! Much appreciated!


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## CanadianHay (Nov 6, 2010)

Hello BCFENCE, thanks for the reply!

Well no I have never produced a forage crop, but we gotta start somewhere, I have been doing a ton of research online and we have horses a used tractor (50hp) and we wanted to get our own forage crop started. I have never been one to shy away from challenges, and we have alot of confidence, but of course we are going slowly, starting with alot of research and getting advice from alot of different sources including forums like this one. Truthfully we probably will not be able to just jump inot a large forage operation day one, and we know this, but it would still behoove us to have a good idea of the machinery being needed or used on our fields.

Thanks to the cautious advice!


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## dbergh (Jun 3, 2010)

Michael,
Welcome to the industry. Raising and harvesting hay is one of the more satisfying endeavors that I have done in my 25 years in production ag. However, it can make you tear your hair out some days and nights but when it goes well it is very rewarding. 
It does take a bit to learn the ropes as far as hay goes but it certainly is not rocket science either. You will learn quickly the right and wrong ways to go about things. Equip. will be expensive on a per acre basis at your proposed size. Can be done but probably won't cash flow well unless you can pick things up real inexpensively. If money is no object then go for it and purchase what you want and need to be self sufficient. If thats not the case try to look at having someone help you with your tillage the first
time around as you won't need it the second or succeeding years unless you pick up more ground. You're harvest equip. will depend on what kind of hay you put up and what your environment is like. For my area we use a swather to cut condition and windrow most everything as we have good drying conditions and we don't want to bleach out the alfalfa more than we have to by laying the hay in an overly wide swath. Conditioning alfalfa will gain you one to two or more days on the dry down time in our area. Grass is not really necessary in my experience as it will dry in one to two days if laid out in an even and wide swath. There are times we bale directly behind the swather after the hay is cured but usually we will roll the hay over once to get everything dried evenly. Most of our hay has an alfalfa component in it so we never touch the hay without a good amount of dew on it so as to retain as many leaves as possible. 
Grass is a different animal- spreading it out is necessary as it will not dry underneath a narrow windrow like alfalfa will. It tends to mat down and not let the air flow through the swath. Losing leaves is not an issue either so it can be raked dry with no loss of quality.
For seeding we usually have our fertilizer dealer blow the seed on the prepared seed bed and very lightly scratch and or roll it in with a packer. Works very nicely and saves the cost of the expensive seeding equip that you would only need every few years anyway.
Tedder, rake and a baler will do everything you need to get the hay in a bale for you. You may not always rake every cutting depending on what you are trying to accomplish and the conditions at that time but you need that capability to do a good job when you get into damp hay. See what the neighbors are using to harvest with - it will probably work for you.
Ditto on buying a good baler-you don't get a very wide window of opportunity to bale in a lot of cases and you need to be out there making bales when the conditions are optimum-not repairing things.
We use a NH stackwagon to clear the bales. I wouldn't touch small bales without one. Very efficient and quick but a bit spendy. You can use an accumulator and trailer as well. I prefer the stackwagon though.
Good luck and don't get discouraged. You can do it.


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## CanadianHay (Nov 6, 2010)

Hello NCSteveH, thanks for the reply!

Yeah I'm still a lil muddled with the whole mowing/conditioning/raking aspect... mostly because some dealers seem to imply raking might not be needed etc etc but having to re-rake due to rain wasn't something I really thought about, I guess you don't always get a good spate of nice weather everytime eh? Thanks alot!

Well we have a utility tractor now (50hp) and were planning on buying a big guy for the HP tasks and go with two to start out. Break downs uhg yes this would definitly put a damper on my day...

The property we are buying is already being harvested by a neighbor, so we hope to utilize his services if we can, but we haven't met the people yet, so will keep our fingers crossed...

Brillion 7" spacing ok, will do some research on that piece of machinery, thanks so much!

We are tarping hay on our current property, it is a new property and the wife could never quite decide where to put a hayshed, or if we were going to stay here long term as she wanted a larger parcel, so I cannot wait to have a proper hayshed... The property we are looking to buy has a decent sized hayshed! Like I said... Cant wait!

Really appreciate the comments and advice!


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## CanadianHay (Nov 6, 2010)

Hello dbergh, thanks so much for the reply!

Yeah we will most likely buy used to start we figured, but we do intend to attempt to buy the surrounding quarters in the future and will eventually upgrade to newwer. Seems around here thye mostly crop hay blends, some alphalfa/grass mix's and some just grass mix's... Havent seen anyone selling pure alphalfa or individual grass crops, always blends. The wife's grandfather grows timothy/brome/orchardgrass which we were leaning to since he seems to do well and sells out every year. Problem is he is getting up there in years and not always functional as a resource.

Ok a question for you some of the material I have read regarding conditioners, was pointing to crimping off the forage stopping sugar loss as the plant attempts to live after mowing... does this just apply to alphalfa or does it work on grass's too? Or is this just markerting spoof. I wish the dealers around here would have email! it's embarassing!

Tedder ok I haven't read much about these, will do.

I think we will stick with round bales to start off with, and squares when we get a bit more cashflow coming in.

Thanks so much for the time and effort in you reply! appreciated it!


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## Dill (Nov 5, 2010)

You can do 98% of what you need to do with an ag sized 50hp tractor. I've seen plenty of people do it. Heck its the same size as a Farmall M and that used to be a big tractor. I've also seen people break plenty of compact 50 eng hp compacts trying to hay. 
So I'd hold off on tillage, equipment, if you really need too hire in a neighbor. And start with a good baler. First off find the mechanic you want to use and ask his opinion on what color he likes to work on. And what color the local dealer is. None of the local dealers have much in stock so everything's ordered for me. And the local wrench likes IH balers, so I have an IH 435. Not the biggest, baddest new machine, but it was dirt cheap and he has 3 parts machines out back. Then decided if you want a kicker or not, that will make the difference with what you need on wagons. We run kickers on our 2 balers and 6 wagons. That way customers are loading their trucks and I'm still able to bale. 
Than you want to look at mowing. You can comfortably run a 7ft haybine with 50hp. My father ran NH 479s for years with a 2240 deere. Or a smaller 5-7ft 3pth disc mower, which is the direction I went. Yes I lost out on the conditioning but the speed was worth it. I can drop a field and tedd it in the same time as 1 pass with the haybine. 
Than a decent 4 star tedder 17 or so ft and a rollabar rake and your good. Figure on 10k if your not good with a wrench and 15k+ if you not an auction hunter or in a hurry.


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## CanadianHay (Nov 6, 2010)

Hello Dill! Thanks for the reply,

Alot of interesting advice! I will check out all of these machines for reference and talk to the mechanics in the area! thats a great tip! Thanks for taking the time to give me your insight! Appreciate it immensely!


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