Make Hay While the Sun Shines

Always wished you knew more about how all those bales sitting in the fields as you drive by are made? Did FFT member Bruce Figger’spost back in August really spark your interest in the baling process? If so, today’s your lucky day. J Many things can be baled and used as feedstuffs for cattle. I’m just going to go through a quick overview of the general process for those that aren’t very familiar with it.

A swather is used to lay down whatever crop you want to bale. When using a sickle swather like the one shown below, the sickles on the front of the swather header cut the hay at its base and an auger moves everything to the middle of the header where the conditioner is located. The conditioner crimps the stalk of the plant to allow air access for faster drying. This leaves windrows of hay in the field, and the bigger the swather header, the more hay there is in a windrow. The length of time that the windrow lays out to dry before being baled depends on the crop, size of the windrow, and the weather and climate conditions. If the hay is too wet when being baled, mold can grow within it, decreasing the quality. If baled too dry, quality is decreased due to loss of nutrient-rich leaves.



New Holland sickle swather



Swather cutting sorghum Sedan grass

Windrows after swathing in beautiful western Kansas!

Once the hay is dry enough, we are ready to rake and bale! Usually one person operates the rakes with the baler operator not far behind. The rakes speed up the baling process by combining two windrows into one. When baling sorghum sedan grass, as shown above, rakes may be needed to help dry out the windrow by rolling it over a couple days prior to baling.

Rakes in action

The windrow is gathered by a pickup attachment in the front of the baler and the hay is delivered into the baler where a series of belts begin rolling it into a tightly wrapped bale. There is a tensioner roller inside the baler that keeps the belts wrapped securely around the hay to ensure that the bale is packed tight from the beginning of the process to the end.

There is a sensor within the baler that will tell the operator when the bale is at the desired height. At this point, the baler will wrap the bale with either twine or net wrap. After the bale is wrapped, the operator can drop the bale out of the baler onto the field. Net wrap is used more commonly than twine because it is more efficient. This process is continued until all the windrows have been picked up and turned into bales!

This photo isn't mine but wanted you to be able to see a freshly made round bale being dropped out of a baler.
Source: ttp://www.rspb.org.uk/community/cfs-file.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/

Such a pretty sight!

Hope this was as interesting to you guys as it is to me. J

Keep calm and bale on,

Tonia

 

What Do Cows Eat?

A few weeks ago I was at home, cutting what may seem like run-of-the-mill hay to the untrained eye:

But, upon closer inspection you may (or more likely may not, due to my photography skills) see what is growing in that field:

 

Still can’t tell? Here’s a close-up brought to you by Google images since I forgot to take one:

 

The dreaded crabgrass

You might recognize this as a weed that has plagued your neighbor’s lawn and is slowly encroaching on your own, the dreaded Crabgrass, and this field has it growing about 3 feet tall.  So if this weed is growing like crazy in the field, why am I swathing and baling it instead of spraying it with herbicide or working it under?  The answer is cows.  Cows can take this weed and turn it into delicious beef. 

This got me thinking about what else cows eat that’s unusual, then I looked at my shirt.  It’s made of cotton.  After cotton is harvested, the seeds are separated from the fibers.  Ranchers can buy those seeds or the seed hulls and mix them into a ration for cattle.  

In my lunchbox I had a sandwich and a cookie.  Large scale bakeries have products that have imperfections such as broken cookies.  Folks with cattle that live near large bakeries can buy these products and feed them to their cattle.  In the end the bakeries don’t have to throw away products that people don’t want to eat, and ranchers get a low-cost feed ingredient. 

The pickup I was driving that day had gasoline in it that was 10% ethanol.  Ethanol is made from distilling corn, and after the distillation process is complete, powdery corn leftovers are… well leftover.  In the cattle industry these are known as distiller’s grain.  Distiller’s grain makes for a great ration ingredient to add protein, phosphorus, and sulfur to a bovine diet. 

The moral of this story is cattle are great at recycling.  They take byproducts of everyday items and, with the help of their ruminant digestive system, turn them into food for people.  So what do cows eat?  Just about anything.  Thanks for reading, and as always if you see or hear of something that concerns you about where your food comes from, ask a farmer. 

Eat Beef,

Bruce Figger





Cattle Eat Hay and Grass and Turn It Into Beef

Cellulose. This polysaccharide is an important component of the cell walls of the vegetation that carpets the ground around the world – which leads it to be the polymer in the most abundance on the Earth. It even makes up 40 – 50% of wood!

So, why do I bring this up? It just so happens that the most abundant polymer on Earth is also one of least digestible polymers for simple stomach mammals such as humans, and its main purpose is to serve as a “dietary fiber.”


A field of one form of cellulose - grass hay - that has been mowed and will be baled soon.

Ruminants such as cattle, sheep, and goats, however, are able to digest various forms of cellulose due to microorganisms that live within their gastrointestinal tract. To explain in further detail, ruminants have a complex stomach that consists of four compartments: the reticulum, rumen, omasum, and abomasum. The rumen contains certain bacteria, such as Ruminococcus, which break down cellulose into glucose that can be utilized during energy production. Simply stated, cattle and other ruminants are physiologically designed to eat cellulose because they have a very small amount of the exact right kind of bacteria in their stomach.

I find this astonishing! Such a small percentage of symbiotic bacteria present in the stomach of a ruminant animal allow an otherwise indigestible polysaccharide to be degraded to glucose and utilized for the production of animal protein which can be consumed by humans and feed our families. And remember when I said cellulose is the most abundant organic polymer in the world??

This is a hay baler - it picks up the mowed hay and winds it into
large bales which are used to feed livestock and horses.

These are some pictures from my family’s operation during the hay season. Yes, due to baling hay and other feed production methods, cattle can continue to utilize cellulose to convert it to animal protein throughout late fall and winter when grass is dormant and of poor nutritional value! Long after the pastures have turned brown from the cold, cattle are eating grasses and forages that are unfit for human consumption to produce safe, healthy and wholesome beef.

Thank you for reading,

Jacob

Do You Have Farmer Style?

The Peterson Farm Brothers sure do - check them out on Facebook and you'll find three young men who are enthusiastically sharing the day to day activities of farm life through their hilarious song parodies. Remember this?




That little ditty has amassed almost 8 million views on YouTube and led to the brothers being featured on national television and news outlets promoting agriculture. They have presented at the FFA National Convention, agribusiness meetings and were most recently recognized at the final K-State home football game. They are doing great things for agriculture and we are excited that Greg (the eldest brother) is a member of Food For Thought! Last night, the Peterson Farm Bros released their newest parody hit titled Farmer Style which is a parody on Gangnam Style, the smash hit that has taken over the music charts. Have a look!
 





This is a great video because not only is it entertaining, it mentions some important agriculture aspects. The constant reference to the importance of hay and forage is evident but they also hammer home that they are a family farm and are passionate about agriculture. Congrats on another great job Peterson Bros. - Food For Thought and the agriculture community are thrilled that you're on our side. Keep up the fantastic work! If you want more info on the Peterson Farm Bros, you can check out their YouTube page, Facebook page or follow Greg on Twitter (@gregpeterson33).

What do you think of the video? We want to hear you feedback? Should the Peterson Farm Bros do another parody? Which song?

 Until next time,
 ~ Buzzard ~