[AT] Fight over hay

[Indiana Robinson]

On Sun, Nov 15, 2009 at 8:59 AM, Cecil Bearden <crbearden at copper.net> wrote:
>
>
> My New Holland round baler broke a shaft last week in the middle of the
> night.  Not knowing what happened, We put the baler in the shed and
> waited for this *&^%% weather to clear.  It has been foggy and mist
> every morning for the last week.  I had about 40 acres cut with a
> swather.  I had to hire a swather to cut this bermuda field because the
> wind has been so bad if you cut it with a mower, when the rake picks it
> up off the ground it blows into the next county.  You can't run the rake
> some directions because the hay will not clean off the wheels from the
> wind.
>
> I found out my round baler was in trouble Thursday and spent most of
> Friday getting the pickup out from under the baler and then getting the
> feeder shaft out of the pickup.  I hooked onto the little vicon square
> baler to get it baled before the rain set in, and bent the PTO shaft
> driving out the gate.  I borrowed a neighbors JD 24WS baler and baled
> about 190 bales Fri night.  I called a contractor friend who wanted the
> hay for silt fence, and he did not seem as interested as he was when I
> asked him if he wanted some hay for this project we are working on..
> Sat morning I made a couple of phone calls and then put an ad on Craigs
> list for small hay bales of horse quality bermuda and listed the
> location.  From the phone calls I had 190 bales spoken for, One taking
> 150 bales and the other taking the 40.  However, the 40 bale guy did not
> show up until about 3pm.  I had 4 people show up with trailers by 10am.
>  I started baling again with the vicon after I had repaired the pto
> shaft and the shear pin on the pickup had broken.  It had been cobbled
> up before I got it..  I think the entire baler has been put together in
> a salvage yard.  I put in a new shear bolt, but the twine knotter
> wasi=n't working on one side.  I quit and went back to the JD baler.  I
> needed to rake these windrows together since the wind was down, but when
> I went to get the rake that was hooked onto the tractor, the tractor had
> a flat and when I aired up the tire, the batteries were down..  I went
> back and just started baling.  This borrowed baler is missing 3
> strippers from the feeder and about 8 teeth.  So, I left some in the
> field and the windrow was wider than the pickup so I had to make two
> passes over the windrow.  I had promised 50 bales to a couple who were
> to be back in about 1 hour.  I went on baling and the contractor friend
> showed up with 2 trailers and his grandkids to load hay and started
> loading even after I told him that 50 bales had to go to someone else.
> Had to stop in the middle of things and let in the nurse that takes care
> of Dad.  So, 2 more trailers show up and load 20 bales on each and hand
> me cash while on the tractor!!!  Finally the couple with the 50 bales
> show up and start to bitch at me for not having enough of the "good" hay
> that they had to have for the horse "cassie" that founders on pasture
> grass only!!! (sounds like a horse with a lead deficiency, about
> 70grains worth).  Then the lady proceeds to start a fight with the
> contractor friend.  He just has the kids put the 45 bales he had loaded
> on her trailer, and then she starts blaming me for her having to borrow
> a trailer from a neighbor and it needed a tire!!!!!   I just told her
> that sundowner sells trailers on I-40..  Next thing happened was my JX85
> new tractor went flat on a front tire, so I had to quit.  Took the
> Belarus with the loader and pulled the baler away from the drawbar and
> shoved it under the shed. Then went back to the tractor and found that I
> did not have a large enough socket with me to take off the wheel.  So,
> went back to the house and just got the wrecker I bought a month ago and
>  towed the tractor back behind the wrecker!!!  Sure nice to have extra
> equipment.  I have to deliver round bales this morning and my Case JX85
> is the only one with a bale spike on it right now, and it has the flat...
>
> I have about 30 acres of bermuda left to cut and bale.  The field is
> clean, no bales left, and I never touched a bale.  Looks like I need to
> find a good square baler and maybe one of those accumulator setups, and
> some more flatproof tires.
>
> Cecil in OKla
====================================



Are we having fun yet? :-)
A smaller scale day like that prompted me to quit baling this summer.
"Everything" was going wrong. I was laying on my back under the baler
working on it out in the field on the hottest day we had this year and
told myself that this wasn't fun anymore. Then I baled a little and
hit a slug that jammed a needle tightly against one knotter and broke
one of the little disc on the knotter. I just parked it in the tool
shed with hay still sticking out of it. It is still sitting there and
may be next spring... I gave thought to hitching onto my Vermeer round
baler but it was so hot I couldn't even see well from the sweat
streaming into my eyes. That line flashed into my mind "Are we having
fun yet?"... I just sat there on the tractor thinking about my place
in the cosmos and whether I really gave a damn about that hay or not.
I finally just parked the tractor...
I will now probably just rent it as horse pastures.



-- 
Have you hugged your horses today?

Francis Robinson
aka "farmer"
Central Indiana USA
robinson46176 at gmail.com