Low-Labor Way To Make Feed, Hay

Low-Labor Way To Make Feed Hay FORAGE HARVESTERS Forage Harvesters 31F It saves a lot of labor all the way from harvest through feeding It also eliminates a lot of equipment says Troy Overstreet a Florida cow-calf producer who has developed an efficient method of harvesting storing and feeding hay He says it s 50 percent less costly than conventional methods Overstreet uses a modified MC Matthews flail chopper which was originally designed to cut green chop and blow it into a trailing wagon It s equipped with flail blades that would normally not only cut the crop but also create a vacuum A blower would then deliver the material into a trailing wagon However Overstreet uses the machine strictly as a vacuum-blower A conventional mower is used to cut the crop which is then raked out evenly across the field for drying Once the material is dry he uses the flail chopper to vacuum the crop material and blow it into a home-built weather-proof wagon that doubles as a feeder A pair of squirrel cage fans one on each side of the chopper s deflector chute help in completely filling and packing the wagon The wagon is built on an old house trailer frame and has plywood sides and a metal roof It measures 20 ft long by 12 ft high There s a hinged 2-ft high metal lid on each side of the wagon at the bottom To feed his livestock Overstreet tows the wagon to the feeding site Then he manually lifts the lids so the cattle can self-feed from the wagon There s no further handling of the crop A hydraulic-operated automatic ball hitch on back of the harvester allows easy wagon hook-up either by a tractor or pickup It s a fast easy system to use Because the wagon is weather-proof hay can remain inside the wagon for up to a year And I only have to handle the crop once says Overstreet I ve been using this system for about 10 years and use a total of 10 home-built wagons Generally I open two or three wagons at a time so cows don t crowd in too much The wagons store enough feed to last my cattle all winter long Each wagon holds about eight tons of feed Cattle are able to reach in far enough that they clean up 99 percent of the feed There s very little wasted feed Some of my pastures are more than 20 miles apart so I often use a pickup to tow the wagons down the road With the automatic hook-up I never have to get off the tractor or pickup to hook up or disconnect the wagon I use it with perennial peanuts a premium quality hay that s grown along the Gulf Coast Cattle love this feed but it has a lot of leaves that get easily separated from the plant stem The flail chopper s vacuum action picks up any separated leaves that would otherwise be lost I also use it with rye grass The wagon has an expanded metal floor which allows air to circulate up through the hay and keep it dry I had been putting hay up in small square bales and later on round bales But square bales required a lot of labor and round bales had to be stored inside a barn to keep them from rotting Years ago the Matthews flail chopper was used by farmers to green chop their hay says Overstreet However you don t see too many on farms any more They re still used in the sod industry to mow grass off sod before it s harvested The flail chopper is only 5 ft wide New Holland makes a flail chopper that s 8 ft wide which would work better because I could load a wagon faster he says There s only a 4 or 5-in high opening on front of the flail chopper so I can t pick the crop up in a windrow or it would bunch up Overstreet says the two squirrel cage blowers together put out about 800 cu ft per min I used these fans because I was able to get them cheap It would probably work better to have a single bigger fan with more blowing power He mounted a wooden nose cone on front of the wagon to keep feed from blowing away when turning at the end of the field The cone also helps to keep rain out of the wagon He says he s working on developing an automatic lifting system for the wagon lids Contact: FARM SHOW Followup Troy Overstreet P O Box 280 Sneads Fla 3246

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