Sometimes , it can seem as thoughproducing hearty hay balesis more of an graphics than a science . Sure , the advance of forward-looking atmospheric condition forecasting make it easier to identify sunny stretches suitable for baling . And a hay moisture and temperature tester reduces the guesswork in determine whether hay is ironic enough to safely bale .
But other areas of making hay are n’t quite so refined . For case , there ’s the art of adjusting the baler so the bales it creates are suitable in terms of size , weighting and twine tautness . These three aspects are all related to , and it can be trickier than you think to correct one without affecting the others .
There are many configurations you may adapt . And many constituent influence the conclusion result . But get them right is significant for making good bales .
Read more : A hay wet tester help with baling and storage .
Headaches with Hay Bales
Let me give you an illustration . On my farm , we bale around 2,000 small substantial hay bales each summertime . Since our gang is pocket-size , we attempt to keep each bale relatively lightweight for easy handling as westack them 12 bales gamy in the hay barn .
But for whatever reason , we struggle to nail down the right portmanteau word of size , weight and twine tension last summer . While the bales were indeed very light ( I ’ve never been capable to discard Bale so high ! ) , they were also far too lax .
The amount of slack in the twine was unmanageable . Bales came apart left and veracious during stacking . And the batch itself was mentally ill since loose Basel make wretched building blocks .
As the summer went on , we grapple to pick off the baler scope to get tighter Basel while still stay fresh the exercising weight in a desirable range . But our troubles with sluttish bales were n’t over . stack hay in a barn is n’t the last clip you ’ll handle it .
Read more : Here are tips for calculating your baling twine want .
Side Note
Now is the time for a quick side note . Even when hay is baled “ wry , ” it still contains at least a piddling wet .
As the hay continues to dry out after baling , the Basel will lose weight unit and — in my experience — physically shrink at least a little . This is n’t really an issue with tightly packed bales . But since many of our bales were already abject on tension , the dry out / shrinking outgrowth only exacerbate the problem .
Indeed , by the time we were feeding those loose Basle in January and February , they consistently fell asunder as hay drop away and squirmed out of its low - tension twine . Handling the bale became so clunky that we ultimately resort to pack the loose hay into great cardboard boxes for easier manipulation and transport .
Fortunately , the slopped Bale we made later in the summer are deem together better . But a challenging winter of handling exploding hay Basle has reiterated a lesson : it ’s important to take the time to get baler setting correct and create hay bales with proper string latent hostility .
Lightweight Basel are nice , but not if it means conduct them around in box because they fall apart too readily .
