Memories about hay or alfalfa

Even though hay or alfalfa was a big part of the farming back at the beginning there were not very many pictures of it, so the majority of these pictures came from the internet.  Thank goodness we have this source or many things would be forgotten, well not forgotten but not as easily described.

I have written about corn and sugar beets which means it is time to write about hay. A crop that was grown on the farm from the very beginning and as I think about it there are many memories that come from it.  Here are a few of them. 

The hay we grew was what they call alfalfa now, hay is made up of grasses and weeds instead of alfalfa, but we called our alfalfa; hay.  It grew out in the fields south of the house, it was cut and then chopped, or bailed.  It was then used to feed the cows, and other animals all year long.  So, it was used to keep the farm and animals alive rather than make money (as some people do today).    

 The alfalfa blooms pretty purple flowers that need to be pollinated by bees so we kept bee boards (some farmers kept beehives actually so did we at least one year, I think but, the honey belonged to someone else) 

Bee boards could also make money if they were full of larva so, you would use a full board hatch them and then they would pollinate the crops and then fill up the board again.  (it usually had to be cleaned to attract them back) 

It was fun to watch the bees go into the hole one way and come out the other …. I discovered that they could turn around in this tiny hole when I put my finger over a hole that a bee had gone into and got stung.  (not as bad as honeybee stings, maybe it was a bite but I was quite surprised) They layer little circles of leaves from down into the hole and all the way out putting eggs in between the layers. (I think) They often cut holes in mom’s plants more than the alfalfa her roses were pretty cut up.  (so if you see plants with circles cut out it is probably from cutter bees) 

A bee memory-----

We were out bucking bails (talked about further down) when Larry got stung by a bee.  The sting before this he swelled up hugely and he had to go to the doctor.  The doctor said that the next time he was stung we would have a very short time to get him to medical help or he would die. (It was before epee pens)  So Dale my oldest brother disconnected the trailer and took off with Larry as fast as the tractor could go (faster than I had ever seen it go)  Karen, Dave and I were left to walk in from the field which was fine but we cut across a pasture that the cows were in.  Karen and I were timid of cows at the time so I think that is why I remember the walk.  Larry made it to the doctor and actually didn't have a reaction and to my knowledge never has since.  We don't know why he reacted so badly that one time, because that is not the normal way (getting better the next)  A side note is that he had rheumatic fever as a kid, and other illnesses that I can't remember but he also was the most athletic and daring - still is I think. 

 I don’t remember how many cuttings we would get in a summer but I know there were several each year and it was a crop that you kept for many years rather than one you had to plant each year.  We flood irrigated it in sections also instead of rows.  

The mower was a long arm with blades or teeth like hair trimmers but way bigger.  

I used to pretend I mowed all the weeds down along the roadway as we drove, when I could put my arm out the window in the wind.  I would raise it up for signs, bridges etc. and lower it the rest of the time. (kind of like a dog with it’s tongue hanging out the window, I love how the wind would affect my arm).  The mower would be raised up to make turns and lowered to mow the alfalfa.

 This picture shows a mower older than ours because ours would attach to a tractor  without the seat. All the other pictures were too new.  (Same problem with the next picture of the rake).

After it is cut, we would go along and rake it into windrows .  

To look like this.  This is when it would rain no matter what was predicted, because rain complicated the process and diminished the quality.  (Like raining when you wash the car)

After it would dry for a while and then it had to be raked again rolling it over to dry the other side.  This picture though a little more modern shows better how the rake worked.

It had to dry to a perfect amount if it dried too much it would drop all the feed leaves off  and lose quality, but if it dried to little is would burn inside out.  The moisture and pressure of being in a stack, if the drying wasn't not quite enough, would create spontaneous combustion  (I remember one chopped hay stack that burned for weeks the fire department came. while we spread it out (that is when it could have burst into flame) it still had to burn until it was done not flames but lots of heat and with the right wind or oxygen it could have been with flames)  I don’t know why we switched to bails, but I think it was less sensitive and far more easily moved.   

 

One of the things I liked about hay days was Uncle Earl would come over and help since he needed Dad's machinery and help to do his own smaller farm.  (it didn't produce enough to purchase equipment as much)  When he came to help mom cooked dinner (the largest meal of the day at noon and he and other workers if there were any came in to eat - always a fun social event)  It was dusty work similar to grain so they wore handkerchiefs over their noses and mouths.  

Another side note was Dad would get the chopper which was pulled behind a tractor not as modern as the one in the picture and hooked behind that would be the two hay wagons.  He could back up and turn them how he wanted (The thing is is if you want to turn a trailer you turn the opposite way to make it go the way you want and as you add a trailer or something it was the other way and so forth.  He could do it!!!

 For bails you wait until the perfect dryness for the same reason and bail it.  Then we went out later to buck the bails – meaning pick them up and throw them up on a wagon or trailer and buck them again off the trailer or truck bed into a stack.  Years later we were able to get a bail lifter that would pick them up and put them on the trailer (we borrowed one so maybe we didn't ever buy one I don't remember – it was much easier on the back and with Dale and Larry grown and gone it was necessary too.  I drove the picker upper a many times so Dave could stack them.  I bucked at least once.   As I said above cutting hay would be the signal to send rain.  It would complicate the drying, so at least one time I had to go out and roll the bales however, as I write that it may be that I rolled them just to put them into a straighter row because it made it so much easier for the machine or my brothers to buck them.  We would find mice hiding under the bails as we turned them.  I remember catching some of the mice and buttoning them into my shirt pocket to feed them to the cats later.

 This picture below is our actual hay in the pickup truck which isn't the usual way when I was growing up of hauling it.  We used a flatbed trailer because there was more room and it was lower to the ground.

 One of the greatest things about stacking is my brothers were very good at stacking with a fort in mind.  One I remember had a secret room.  They most have made the tunnel two ________ high because I remember crawling but not suffocating through.  Anyway this one tunnel if you knew that it was there instead of making the turn you could slide through a little slit in the floor and end up in a room where we could sit up and have a secret meeting – we could all fit in there at once.  If we had friends over we could go along and disappear.  It was very dark by the way.  We would play until a black widow would move in and then collapse it.  That was the side game and joy of baled hay.

 It was during the activity of hauling hay into stack that I learned TV shows and movies lie.  You cannot jump off of even a slow moving vehicle without getting rolled or at least sat on your bum good and hard.

 Bales are held together with bailing twine or later came wire (much harder on the hands when bucking a bale but the chances of it breaking were less)  the bales would break apart naturally when the twine or wire was cut and then it could by pitched in sections into the stanchion for the animals to eat using a pitch fork.  

 

Here is a real picture of a stack and the stanchions where the cows ate.

 (my oldest brother told a story of stabbing grandma Ottie DeCoursey in the leg – accidentally I don’t actually know how but he was young and I think he didn't see her)  Pitchfork pictured below.

 I remember having the many tined one which was for the chopped hay.

 Here are real pictures of hay from the farm

Before I was born they did long hay haystacks and used the derrick (the tall wood structure pictured below) to move it around.  We or I used the derrick to swing on but even though it was out in the barnyard most of my life I didn’t ever see it used as in the past.

 I don't know but I assume they used pitchforks to get it on the truck and bring it in from the fields.

 This is a picture of my Dad's 1st haystack.

I enjoyed the memories anyway.