Hay There!

It was Sunday morning, a day we are supposed to spend with the Lord and rest,
when the farmer texted me, "I'm off to rake hay."

"Okay, love you." I responded knowing he wouldn't be home for several hours.

'I'll go nap for the both of us' is what I was really thinking but didn't say.

Later that day he came home right as I was waking up from my Sunday nap.

"There are over 100 bales if you want to take some photos," as he walked in the door.

I instantly perked up and ran for my camera and boots!

Some people like the smell of fresh cut grass. 

I prefer the smell of fresh cut hay.

And I appreciate my husband for knowing my love and obsession with the beauty of the bales.

There are lots of pretty sites in the country.

One of my personal favorites is the big, round hay bale.

It evokes childhood memories of jumping from one to the other in the barn yard.

It reminds me of watching the cattle run towards the tractor as I rode with my dad to feed them a new, round bale.

While I do love the round bale, I sometimes hate the hay.

It gets stuck on clothes pretty easily so it ends up in my house and on the floors.

It's in the the laundry basket and my washer and in the lint trap.

It's on the floorboards of every vehicle on the farm.

I have found it in my purse, in my hair, in my shoes and stuck to the bottom of my feet.

But hey, that's just part of making hay.

And the reason we make hay and these round bales is to feed the cattle in the winter time.  

This particular field ended up producing 100.5 round bales of hay.

Our cattle herd will go through all 100 of these bales in just one month.

"When you get up to 75 head that weigh around 1100-1200 pounds, 

you have to make a lot of hay," the farmer told me.

And remember, they love when I take pictures of them eating their hay in the winter.

Farmers usually rush to get to the field to cut, rake and bale hay.

You have to make it while the sun still shines because the next day it may rain, 

just like it did the day after these bales were made.

As I was asking the farmer about his hay, he reminded me of a few fun cow facts.

Cows can eat low quality food because of their complex digestive system which includes 

4 compartments in one stomach.

Their digestive system is more efficient in extracting all the nutrients out of the food unlike other farm animals like pigs and chickens which have a simpler digestive system.

They do not bite grass but rather wrap their tongue around it.

Cows are social animals, maybe that's why I love hanging out with them!

And they can only walk up stairs, not down!  

After a hard day's work of makin' hay, the farmer was kind enough to take me to the field to photograph the bales that will feed our cattle in the coming months.  Sitting on top of one of these really makes me feel like I'm on top of the world, again, something I used to think as I child.

People have asked me what farmer's do in the winter time.

And some have asked what they do in the summer. 

Well in the summer, they think about the winter and prepare the food for their cows among other things.  And in the winter, they get anxious about planting their fields and feed their cows that food they prepped and stored in the barn during the summer.

While many of you don't cut, rake or make round bales of hay to feed your cattle in the winter, surely you do something productive before the rain comes.  I hope you finish it and feel good about your work just like the farmer.  And when the rain starts to fall, make sure to enjoy your nap.