To offset its lack of Old World flavor (which only the most
discerning of livestock will notice) baled hay has the
advantages of being easier to handle, requiring less time
and labor to put up, and taking less storage space. The
chief drawback here, however, is that you'll need a baler-a
small factory in itself-which is often expensive both to
buy and to maintain. (Beware of "bargains" we bought a
twine tie baler, used, for $200 and put many gray hairs on
our heads as a result.)
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Unless you're putting up enough dried foliage say 15 to 20
acres to justify the purchase of a good used baler, I'd
suggest that you either stack your hay or hire a custom
operator to do the baling for you. A check on local rates
may very well show that the service is less expensive than
ownership of the necessary equipment.
A closing note that may be of special interest to communes
and other groups: In most of this country's rural areas,
it's possible to pick up some extra money during the summer
by "bucking" hay (taking bales from the field and building
them into a neat pile or putting them up in a barn's loft).
You'll generally be paid at a fixed rate of so many cents
per bale in the western half of the country and so much per
hour back east. We've found that a bucking crew of a female
driver and three men can handle an average of 500 bales a
day.
Before you start calling me a sexist, by the way, please
consider that every one of these solid blocks of fodder
weighs about 75 pounds. I well remember the day when one of
our woman members decided to help buck while the rest of us
took turns driving. She ended the afternoon in tears of
exhaustion. It's that kind of work which is why most
farmers are more than willing to pay somebody else to do it
for them. Before you commit yourself to bucking 10,000
bales, though, try working at the job on a trial basis for
a day or two first just to make sure you want the money as
much as you'll have to labor to get it.
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