THE IKRIGATION AGE. 



153 



A SERMON ON HAY MAKING. 



BY AN EXPERT. 



If, immediately following the mower, you should 

 take a fork full of the freshly mown hay, carry it 

 under the shade of a big tree and gently toss it in 

 the warm summer air, you would make perfect hay. 

 The hay would not be bleached, sun burned or discol- 

 ored; it would retain its nutritious juices and its green 

 color; it would be uniformly cured; it would not be 

 broken or tangled. 



Our aim is to approximate such treatment as 

 nearly as we can in the field. To prepare shade we 

 must use the hay itself; by raking it into large wind- 

 rows quickly, a very inconsiderable fraction of the hay 

 is left exposed to the sun; thus it shelters or shades 

 itself. The rays of the sun are, in their direct effect 

 upon the grass, absolutely and unqualifiedly a detri- 

 ment to good hay making. They sun burn and bleach 

 the hay, robbing it of its nutriment, destroying the 

 tender and finer parts of the plants and minimizing 

 its feeding value, and as a natural result its sale value. 

 It also lightens the weight of the hay, thus further 

 reducing its commercial worth. 



Grass left in the swath for curing makes golden 

 hay, and very undesirable hay for feeder or buyer. 

 The greener you can get your cured hay the better 

 your grade, and the only way to get green hay is to 

 stir cure it, and get it out of the direct sunshine as 

 quickly as possible. The sun is constantly drawing 

 moisture from the atmosphere; it is of indirect service 

 in raising the temperature so as to set in operation 

 the natural process of evaporation. 



The atmosphere in turn searches for moisture 

 wherever it can be found. Now, it is evident that if 

 the warm and dry summer breezes can be passed through 

 the hay that the curing will be- accelerated. The grass, 

 as it falls from the mower, is laid in tiers by each 

 stroke of the knife; each tier or layer overlapping the 

 other and thus forming a thatch. This thatch pre- 

 vents the atmosphere from coming in contact with the 

 under hay, thai which lies in the stubble. Bear in 

 mind that it is the under hay that needs your atten- 

 tion in the thatched form. 



The grass shades the ground far more densely 

 than when standing unmoved, and wherever the ground 

 surface is shaded there evaporation is minimized and 

 the moisture constantly rising out of the cooler ground 

 and remaining unvaporized, cools and dampens the un- 

 der side, if not the entire under half of the swaths. 



Now the purpose is to s ave the top fro mbleach- 

 ing and discolorizing and to cure the bottom, and thus 

 to cure the hay uniformly it becomes necessary to stir 

 that hay, at the same time converting the swaths into 

 windrows or hay cocks. In the older countries, such 

 as Germany, France, Sweden, etc., it is common cus- 

 tom for the women and children to go into the field 

 with the mowers and just as soon as the grass is cut 

 they begin working it, tossing it in the air and piling 

 it into hay cocks or raking it into windrows. These 

 people know the value of hay properly made and they 

 take pans with it to get the best possible grade. Our 

 American farmers will some day open their eyes and 

 see what they are now annually wasting by improper 

 and careless hay making methods. 



What the foreigner does by hand we propose to 

 do by machinery, thereby effecting an economy in 

 the work, and at the same time gaining as high, if 

 not higher, grade of hay. But we have been digress- 

 ing. We are now ready for our windrow. We want 

 a place for it. We do not believe in th ethrowing of 

 some swaths into undisturbed ones, for that would be 

 only aggravating what we are trying to avoid, viz., a 

 damp stubble. We want a raked stubble and a dry 

 stubble. We want this because a raked stubble on the 

 average summer day quickly becomes warm and we 

 want that warmth in our hay making; furthermore, 

 from a raked dry stubble, we get the reflected rays 

 of heat to help force rapid curing. 



Summarizing, we would say, that good hay mak- 

 ing consists of procuring a speedy handling of the hay 

 immediately after cutting, exposing as little of the 

 hay as is possible to the direct sunshine; also in expos- 

 ing that little as short a time as is possible, and that 

 by stir curing the hay, moving it away from its origi- 

 nal stubble and throwing it on a dry warm stubble, by 

 soft handling, will produce the best possible results, 

 giving the farmer a higher grade of hay than is pos- 

 sible with any other method of handling. 



Now, we ask you to please follow our process step 

 by step. We build the only two-way or reversing side 

 delivery hay rake, or what we now term our Tedding 

 Windrower. We advocate following the mower with 

 this machine about an hour after cutting. The rake 

 is designed to take two 5-foot swaths. With the cross 

 carrier set so as to discharge the hay to the right, drive 

 the rake with the mower, throwing the first and second 

 swaths onto the third; drive completely around the 

 field. In starting the second round, reverse the cross 

 carrier, and still followin gthe mower, drive to straddle 

 the third and fourth swaths. By doing this you then 

 collect all of the hay from the first and second swaths 

 as well as the third and fourth swaths, throwing them 

 back onto the dry raked stubble prepared by the rake 

 on its first round. That this stubble dries so quickly 

 you can attest by placing your hand down in the stubble 

 soon after raking. In a remarkably few minutes on 

 a warm summer day, you will find it quite hot, your 

 hand being considerably warmer in the stubble than 

 in the direct sunshien. 



In handling hay in this manner it is lifted entirely 

 free from the stuble and carried through the air about 

 forty feet; the hay from two swaths is handled thus 

 twice and the hay from the last swath, having only 

 one stir curing, is left loose on top of the windrow, 

 so that the air can circulate easily through it. 



Following this method the farmer can now and 

 cure his hay in the forenoon and in the afternoon of 

 the same day he can pull his New Deer.e loader into 

 the field and can have all of his cut hay in the barn 

 before nightfall, all out of harm from the dew, pos- 

 sible rain or the morrow's sun. 



The floated gathering drum with its flexible fingers, 

 not only handles the hay positively and absolutely clean, 

 hut treats it kindly and softly, without damage or 

 roping of any nature. The hay is handled as a sheet 

 between two rollers. Notice that our raking is done 

 about six inches above the stubble, the hay being 

 thatched as before described. If the rake is driven with 

 the mower it helps lift itself, and thus our cylinder 



