This was my field, prior to baling........made 130 bales to the acre.



This was neighbors.......made about half of what mine did........




Gets hauled to the barn with one of these.......and aside from me driving and unloading, of my normal 2 man crew......one is a girl. Just don't get in her way and nobody gets hurt!

Silage wrapped bales. Haulin em home now.

I am going to have some very nice hay equipment for sale as soon as we can find a place to move. Two -JohnDeere square balers one hardly used both attached to Steffen system . https://steffensystems.com
https://www.deere.com/en/hay-forage/baling/348-square-baler/
Three grapples. https://steffensystems.com/ed-small-bale-handlers.php

Never had a good time in a hay field..... Only the hay loft

We I live now forage harvesting has really changed. We have very few sources of small dry square hay producers anymore. It is also not easy to make good dry hay close to the lake with the east winds common during the afternoons during the summers. The large dairies use huge equipment. Most new choppers are 600-800 horse machines that have 9-11 foot hay heads and Kemper style heads that cut corn with heads that can take 12 rows at a time. Tonnage per hour is huge. The hay is cut with tri-section hay machines that mow and crimp 27 foot per trip. Most merge 54 foot windrows for 1st cutting and 72 foot for later cuttings and chop into long tractor pulled forage boxes or semis at about 7-9 miles per hour. This is why small fields and fields that have very odd shapes and are small are not economical for large farmers to rent or own. Can't be using 7-10 acre odd shaped fields with 3 million dollar equipment and do that 4-5 times per year. We get our small squares for our sheep from farmers that have these small and odd shaped stony fields.

Bryce

My wife told me just last week only city girls think the hay is a fun idea. That's due to their inexperience and not knowing how uncomfortable hay gets.

Country girls get round up more and dont mind the scratches

Pretty sure this can be proven incorrect.

Interesting contraption. Have always just hooked the hay rack to the bailer and loaded them as they come off the bailer.

Cool stuff guys, got some on the ground now that's about ready to bale and calling for rain tomorrow afternoon if I can get some rolled i will take a pic.

Hope you can beat the rain. Good luck!

That bale wagon is neat. Never seen nothing like that around here.

The bale wagon / hay monsters showed up late 60's, early 70's. There were about 3 commercial versions......all made around Wichita. Deweze was considered the best of them, and mine is also a Deweze. Concept is not widely know, as they didn't last long. About 5 to 10 years after they showed up, Vermeer came out with the upsized version of the Allis Chalmers rotobaler......and farmers started making big round bales that didn't have to be stored inside or hauled same day they were baled. Small square bales and hay monsters went obsolete overnight.

Most hay monsterts were made to haul 150 to 200 bales, depending on how high you wanted to stack. Experienced 3 man crew could do 1,500 bales a day. 4 guys taking turns stacking could do 2,000. Normal seasonal load for the best of them was 50,000 to 100,000 bales each.

Talked to a guy about a month back and he made one from a school bus. His had an interesting twist.......he built it so the bed would tilt up like a New Holland stackliner. It only hauled 100 bales, but you didn't have to unload them. Only back it into place, tilt the bed up and drive out from under the stack. Only requirement was a pole barn with eaves high enough bed would tilt up. Otherwise, it also had the elevator extension on the snout and would shoot them up into a loft.

We were stacking in a loft last week......about 95F and when I went outside, it was like walking into AC.

Hauling hay.......it's not for everybody.

BTW, kid I bought my monster from said he quit hauling hay because he was too old for it. How old are you? 22

I'm old enough to be on Medicare.........and I still do it......but not 2,000 bales a day.

No rain until next Friday for me. Only 40% chance @ that. Be safe, everyone .

Interesting stuff! 'd never seen or heard of one of these. Thanks for posting this.