Harvesting Oats & Baling Straw

Our neighbor showed up around 1:00 p.m. to start combining the oats.

We had some seriously gorgeous weather all day long!

Of course, I had to get one last shot of the field adorned in its striped graphics.  This next photo was taken from inside the tractor I was driving, pulling the baler and basket.

In the next photo, see the straw coming out of the left rear corner of the combine, making a swath for baling.

Nice, clean, golden straw……to keep cows and calves comfortable all year long!

And, what about the actual oats that were harvested?  As I type this, the grain is being unloaded from the truck into the bin:

The combine’s meter recorded 1400 bushels harvested from 15.9 acres.  My trusty calculator computes that out to 88.05 bushels per acre.  Husband says that’s the best oat yield we’ve ever had.  I have no idea how that happened……the weather must have been the major factor, for we don’t fertilize oats.  The name of this particular oat type is “Ogle”.

The oats will be an ingredient in cow and calf feed throughout the year.

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I drove the baler for 5-1/2 hours this afternoon and evening.  There were a few glitches here and there, but overall it was a good day of baling, especially because the weather was absolutely perfect.  I’ve had it for the day, though---clothes are itchy, neck is stiff, eyes are burning---so I’m signing off to find the ibuprofen bottle and then hit the hay.  How thankful I am not to be sleeping on straw tonight!

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