[AT] Cattle farmers

[Cecil Bearden]

My Dad grew up working horses to farm.  He always said you did not feed  
alfalfa to a horse that was going to be worked.  They would get too 
hot.  They only fed alfalfa in the winter.   I sold horse hay for many 
years before I got cow that eat more than I can raise.  I had people 
coming from 15 mi away to get my hay.  I baled hay for a couple of 
"horse" people around here and they would wait until the hay was dry as 
broom straw before baling. Many times I baled mine the same day it was 
cut.  I still do if I can get my old joints to keep calm..!!    Nearly 
every buyer would remark how my hay was always so green when opened up 
and their horses would eat it like it was candy.  I had one lady who 
called and returned 4 round bales because her 3 horses ate it up in 3 
days.  She said she could not afford to feed that much hay!!!!

Horse people are a funny lot.  My 2 horses are 15 and 11 yrs old, and 
they eat anything I drop over the fence.  I cut the weeds off their 
field with a swather and baled it to keep the weeds from going to seed. 
   I baled it very very green.  Big juicy weeds, 4 ft tall.  2 weeks 
later they were eating the bales where they sat!!!    Moswt horse people 
don't want johnson grass as they say is is bad for horses.  I had a vet 
tell me that a horse could handle more Johnson grass and the prussic 
acid that forms during heat stress than cattle could.  I noticed that my 
horses keep the johnson grass ate down as far as they can reach over the 
fence...   I bale it with the TS110 and now the new 504R Vermeer, then 
haul it in with the old 5000 Ford with the hyd bale trailer behind.   
The best thing I can find on the new baler is it will wrap a 12in 
diameter bale.  I can wrap one like the old Allis roto Baler.   Net wrap 
though...


Cecil

On 8/30/2021 6:00 AM, Indiana Robinson wrote:
> I wouldn't know why it wouldn't be OK. As a late first cutting it will 
> naturally be a little stemy but it will still be hay. I have seen beef 
> cattle in particular winter through on some remarkably rough hay. Much 
> of what is feedable is often just the perception by people of what is 
> good hay. I've seen people that would turn up their noses at decent 
> hay on a good hay year but in a shortage of hay year (or a tight 
> wallet year) they would feed thistles and scrub brush and be glad to 
> get it. Son Scott once had a girlfriend that kept her horses here. I 
> knew money was tight so I offered to give her some fairly decent hay I 
> still had in the loft. She turned it down saying that her primary 
> horse was a show horse and he couldn't eat that rough hay. I pointed 
> over to the corner of the fence line and said "He ate that damned 
> gate"...  :-)
> Our own little private herd of 7 useless but loved equine creatures 
> (mostly rescues) normally winter over just running about 65 acres of 
> corn stalks and soybean stubble and usually get fat on them. When the 
> weather gets really bad we do usually stick in a round bale, often 
> something son Scott didn't try to sell because it didn't tie right or 
> was miss-shaped.
> Most of the time if the world is encased in ice or deep snow we feed a 
> few alfalfa cubes. About a pound per horse, hand-fed like treats late 
> in the day seems to make a good difference in keeping them warm 
> overnight. They have shelter but seldom use it. A couple of 
> semi-recent old and starved rescues do get special feeding. They are 
> getting pretty slick looking now.
> To be on topic... Any time I take an old tractor out in the pastures 
> they all have to gather around it and study it carefully. Not sure 
> why, none of them know how to drive...
>
>
> On Sun, Aug 29, 2021 at 11:52 PM Mike M <meulenms at gmx.com 
> <mailto:meulenms at gmx.com>> wrote:
>
>     Hi all, I have a question. I have a guy that bales my field, for his
>     cattle. I just give it to him, because it saves me the trouble of
>     brush
>     hogging it, and it doesn't go to waste. It's  been so wet in SE
>     Michigan, he hasn't been able to get on it it yet, He's only baled
>     40 of
>     the 200 acres he normally bales. At this point of the year, is the hay
>     even any good?
>
>     Thanks,
>     Mike M
>
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> -- 
>
> Francis Robinson
> aka "farmer"
> Central Indiana USA
> robinson46176 at gmail.com <mailto:robinson46176 at gmail.com>
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