20 CULTIVATED FORAGE CROPS OF THE NORTHWEST. 
sections, especially in California, where there are winter rains, the hay 
is often stored in barns or sheds. 
The hay is usually stacked by machinery. If the stack is made in 
the field, sweeps or bull rakes are occasionally used for hauling the 
bunches to the stacks, but these implements have the serious objection 
of shattering the leaves, causing corresponding loss of valuable fodder. 
For this reason the bunches are usually loaded by hand on wagons 
provided with hay racks (Pl. IV, fig. 1). At the stack the hay is 
unloaded from the wagons by horsepower, the machine used for this 
purpose being called a stacker or hay derrick. 
The most commen type of stacker throughout the Northwest is some 
modification of the pole, or mast and boom, stacker. This is essen- 
tially a derrick, with pulleys and a hay fork, by which several hun- 
dred pounds of hay can be lifted from a wagon and deposited upon the 
stack. Pl. I, Pl. III, and Pl. IV, fig. 2, show some of these forms. 
The stackers are generally homemade. The derrick may be sup- 
ported by a heavy framework or may consist of poles held in place by 
guy ropes. The hay is usually lifted by means of a fork, but nets are 
in common use in some localities. The most common style of fork is 
that known as the Jackson fork, or, outside of California, as the Cali- 
fornia fork. For alfalfa the fork usually has four tines, but for grass 
hay five or six tines. By means of a small rope the operator upon the 
wagon can dump the fork load of hay upon the stack at any desired 
point. (See Pl. I, fig. 1.) One or two horses attached to the lift- 
ing rope or cable furnish the power to lift the load. The load on 
the fork is swung over the stack by slightly leaning the derrick toward 
the stack. The fork then swings by its own weight. The empty fork 
is drawn back to the wagon by means of the dump rope. Sometimes 
the load is swung over the stack by hand. Another form of fork occa- 
sionally seen is the harpoon fork. Instead of the fork there is some- 
times used a net, also called a sling or hammock. Three or four of 
these are placed at intervals in the hay as it is being loaded. At the 
stacks, the nets full of hay are lifted from the wagon to the stack by 
means of derricks. 
Another form of stacker which has proven very satisfactory is the 
cable derrick. Pl. I, fig. 2, illustrates this form. Forks or nets may 
be used with this style. In eastern Colorado and parts of Wyo- 
ming an improved stacker was in common use. 
The bunches may be brought to the stacker with horse sweeps, but 
the distance must not be great or there will be too much loss of leaves. 
Hence the stacks are smaller than when the bunches are brought by 
wagon. 
The stacks of alfalfa are commonly made about 25 feet wide and 
high, and as long as convenient, often 100 or more feet. 
Throughout most of the alfalfa region the hay is put up during the 
dry season, and the process can therefore go on without fear of 
