Montana farmer-stockman. [volume], June 15, 1950, Image 1

About Montana farmer-stockman. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1947-1993

Image provided by: Montana Historical Society; Helena, MT

                
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June 15/ 1950
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—Photo by Si man son
A Phillips county operator finds that he can com*
bine some of the advantages of "silo cure" with the
speed of field stacking by using a tractor-mounted
stacker to build shocks. The hay "sweat cures"
in the shocks, which are later stacked.
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—Montana Farmer-Stockman Photo
Ralph Thomas, Johnson county, Wyoming, "rolls his own," , . .
hay that is with a one-man roller baler. Thomas has used the
baler for three years of haying operations. He says it stacks
well, sheds the rain and unrolls easily for winter feeding when
strings are cut.
—Photo by Osborne
A Gallatin county operator field chops his hay and
stores it in this steel silo. Self-unloading wagons
But the Big Idea Is to
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With Most Feed Value , Least Labor
Come haying time the problem is to get
that alfalfa off the field at the right time in
the easiest and fastest way possible and
store it in a form that will assure the maxi
mum value in the feed rack. Reported here
in pictures and stories are effective meth
ods Montana and Wyoming operators have
worked out. One grower tells how he ex
perimented with a variety of procedures
and came to ensiling as the best for him.
Another report on an efficient stacker-shock
method.
Silage Provides Weather,
Quality Insurance
By JAMES A. OSBORNE
Gallatin County
IN MY MIND, efficiency in harvesting
hay has lagged behind that of all other
farming operations in Montana.
My first attempt at solving this problem
was the chopping of hay out of the stack
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NORTHERN WYOMING
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with a stationary chopper and hauling and
stacking near the barn. After handling hay
in this manner for a couple of years, I
became dissatisfied and decided to elimi
nate the stacking loose hay, then opening
the stacks in the winter to chop. The open
stacks would be snowed on and some of the
snow would sift down into hay to be
chopped, resulting in increased moisture
followed by heating and mould.
Field Chopping
I traded the stationary chopper in on a
new windrow pickup chopper. This was
quite a change in haying methods for our
area and required a complete change in
machinery. I fixed up temporary boxed
wagons to haul the chopped hay with a door
in the center of one side so we would have
to shovel hay only from each end to the
center. We also remodeled an old barn for
storage and feeding, putting in concrete
floors on each side with feed bunks and
(Please Turn to Page 12)
are used to haul the hay from the field to the silo
filler seen at lower right.
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— Montan» Farmer-Stockman Photo
Robert and Thomas Feenan, Flathead county, put
up their hay with this field chopper. It is put into
the barn or open sheds for future cattle feeding.
Economy in putting up the hay crop and less waste
in actual feeding are factors that sold them on thla
method.