Devonviolet Acres

[Devonviolet]

Wow, @farmerjan! Y’all cut a LOT of hay! And all that rain, to make the grass grow nice and tall. But, like you said . . . “Feast or famine”. Once it rains, ya have to wait so the hay dries out before you can bale it. If its raining for days and weeks on end, it’s kinda hard to cut and bale.

I sure wish we had enough land to do our own hay. We sure aren’t afraid to sweat a bit, to get the job done!

We went out and cut down another tree this morning. Then, after I cut all the branches to workable lengths, we went down the line and cut all the trunks into 16” lengths, for stacking.

After our work day out in the back pasture/woods, I’m suffering with chigger bites again. They aren’t nearly as bad as the ones it got picking the Queen Anne’s Lace though. They are mostly around my ankles and a few on my shins. I recently read, online, that if you take small doses of 99.9% pure Sulphur powder (in molasses or honey) daily, for a week and then every other day, for a week and then once a week, after a few weeks, the chiggers and ticks leave you alone. I ordered some of the Sulphur and I am going to try it. I also put some of the powder in some lotion, to put on the bites, along with some Sweet Birch Oil, and that seems to help.

 

[Mike CHS]

We had a chance to watch a group of an Amish family baling hay this morning and it was pretty awesome. They don't like to be photographed so we didn't take any pictures but it was an awesome sight.

 

[CntryBoy777]

My Mom swore by taking B complex in preventing ticks and chiggers....she was never bothered by them after she began taking it daily....

 

[Devonviolet]

My Mom swore by taking B complex in preventing ticks and chiggers....she was never bothered by them after she began taking it daily....

I take a B-100 capsule every day. Have for years. So, I’ll have to keep trying, to find something to help stop them from biting me. I have also recently read, that if you put Sulphur in a sock, and tap it on your feet and legs, that willl stop the chiggers from biting. We have garden Sulphur, so I will have to try that.

 

[Latestarter]

It's a real problem with biting insects of all types when you're as sweet as DV is...

 

[Devonviolet]

It's a real problem with biting insects of all types when you're as sweet as DV is...

Ohhh My Gosh! Now you’re making me blush, LS! That is so sweet of you!

 

[Baymule]

I am glad that you got some hay nailed down. In 2011 there was a drought, over 30 days straight that the temps were 100 degrees, plus. Trees turned brown and died. We were lucky enough to find round bales for the bargain price of only EIGHTY DOLLARS. The going rate was $125 to $150. So we were pretty fortunate, but still......

We are glad that we found and bought hay. It might get real scarce this year.

 

[Devonviolet]

I am glad that you got some hay nailed down. In 2011 there was a drought, over 30 days straight that the temps were 100 degrees, plus. Trees turned brown and died. We were lucky enough to find round bales for the bargain price of only EIGHTY DOLLARS. The going rate was $125 to $150. So we were pretty fortunate, but still......

We are glad that we found and bought hay. It might get real scarce this year.

YIKES!!! $150 for ONE round bale! Now, that’s supply and demand at it’s finest!

Yeah, 30 straight 100 degree days is just too much! That is enough to kill some good size trees. We have quite a few trees, on our property, that survived the drought, but they have a lot of big dead branches up high, that come down in heavy winds. Out in our woods, we have some massive trees (we’re talking 36”+ trunks) that are totally dead and ready to come down anytime now. Now THAT’S what you call a true “widow maker”. I’m not so sure I want to be the one to take those down or cut them apart!

I remember, when we lived in Lake Worth in 1981. On May 1st I was out weeding my flower bed at 8:00 in the morning. It was already so hot, that it was miserable. That was the first of 100 consecutive days 100+ degrees. We lived in an all brick house on a hill, with the back side to the West. That afternoon sun just baked the bricks and with little insulation, the house baked as well! At 11:00 at night, the back porch was 103F. A part went out in the AC, and it took two weeks for the HVAC guy to come fix it. With the AC running full bore, the coolest we could get the house was 87F. The house was like an oven, but that was better than the outside temp of 100 degrees plus!

 

[greybeard]

I take a B-100 capsule every day. Have for years. So, I’ll have to keep trying, to find something to help stop them from biting me. I have also recently read, that if you put Sulphur in a sock, and tap it on your feet and legs, that willl stop the chiggers from biting. We have garden Sulphur, so I will have to try that.

This does usually work to keep them off you and your clothes. We used to go thru a lot of powdered sulfur back when this area was covered in seed ticks. Didn't worry about putting it in a sock...just dipped it out of the bag by the handful and put it all over our boots, socks, and as much as we could on our jeans and forearms.
Of course, you smell like sulfur for a few days afterwards too but so did everyone else around here.

 

[farmerjan]

We usually make around 100 acres of hay, two cuttings normally, and a third of the orchard grass if we can get the first cutting off early enough and we get timely rain to grow it back. We make around 1500 round bales and 2-4,000 square bales of the orchard grass. Realize that only about 30-40 acres of this is good orchard grass, the rest is just "grass" hay of whatever is growing on places that we have been renting or asked to cut off. Nearly all first cutting is round baled due to the difficulty of getting it made dry, and it is often pushing the over mature stage due to the weather. Then we make most all the pure orchard grass second cutting as square bales. Nearly all that is sold, and we are running short of enough small square bales for customers and the list of potential customers keeps growing. The money is in the small square bales, but the cost is too with all the handling. And no matter how good things are, we are at the mercy of the weather as you all are, and are seeing there in the south.
We buy our alfalfa as it is more demanding on getting it made and we just cannot always get it made when it needs to be made. 1st cutting is always ready early, and can get very stemmy and we aren't in a position to chop it as haylage, but that would be ideal. Chop first cutting then make hay for 2nd and 3rd cutting, when the stems are finer. So we just buy it and try to concentrate on getting the orchard grass made better. We also plant and feed sorghum/sudan grass; we use it for 2 years in fields that we are renovating into orchard grass hay fields. On a couple of places where we have long term leases, it pays to renovate and replant orchard grass when the existing field gets too many weeds coming up. Rye or wheat or barley in the fall, cut off in the spring, plant sorghum/sudan grass get 2 cuttings usually, then barley or wheat again in the fall, sorghum/sudan grass in the spring, then replant with orchard grass the next fall. Alot of money in the seed too.