Super Long Day

After milking this morning, Bruce went out and checked the seeding (alfalfa, peas, triticale) to see how it is doing. We have not planted this combination before and intend to harvest it for cow feed so timing is everything. It still has a bit of growing to do but we don't know how long it will take with the heat coming. Checking its progress will be a daily vigil. We actually managed to cut some pasture today but the process turned out to be a bit longer than we had planned. The water lines run along both sides of this pasture just inside the fence. Bruce had to decide whether he would spend the time trimming around the fence so he knew exactly where the water line was, or guess and take the chance of cutting holes in it. He decided to run the trimmer around first so he would have a cleaner, more complete job when we are done chopping. In total the trimming took a couple hours, including the time it took for me to run gas out to him when he ran out on the far end of the fence. Along with gas I brought drinks and donuts so he got a break and continued. Once again his cell phone came in handy. After the trimming was done Bruce moved the cows to a new paddock. The grass they are on is really nice and Bruce doesn't want them to waste it. They spent part of the day back on the piece they had over night and then this afternoon they got new grass. It is funny how spoiled they are. They did not think this was a good idea! After a late dinner Bruce cut the first round and then Ed took over cutting and Bruce started chopping. The mature grass mixed with the regrowth underneath has just enough moisture so we will be able to cut and chop right away. With the tractor problem yesterday the hay got a bit dryer than we would like on the top of the silo.  Bruce chopped 2 loads and put them in the silo at Ed's and then had to level it off and cover it. Even with a distributor, the haylage varies in height by 3-4 ft. so this has to be forked around so the silage is flat.  A silo cover for a 16’ silo is 18’ across.  Bruce spreads the plastic out and then folds back part of it just enough so he can dig a trench about 8” x 8” around the edge.  He throws this haylage on top of the plastic, and when he has enough dug, out he tucks the plastic in this trench and then packs the haylage he had dug out as tightly as he can on top of the plastic to seal it.  The fermintation process starts pretty quickly. Not only does the silo get warm from the feed heating, it can create a deadly silo gas in the process. For this reason, the silo gets leveled off immediately, and since we aren't going to feed from there until winter, the cover keeps the mold possibilities down to a minimum.  After this whole process Bruce still had to feed and milk tonight. It is another late night but at least we are getting to make some progress.   (blogger isn’t working.  Wednesday, 6/29, 11:30 p.m. thank heavens for the copy and paste feature)