Advantages of a Hay Stacker

Reader Contribution by Darrell Jodock
Published on September 7, 2016
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Building Stacks of Hay

The Ballards were forming bales for long-distance transport. Since we were putting hay in a stack, hay was never lifted by hand. Yes, some of it was moved around by the person in the stack, and in the winter it was pushed to the openings in the floor of the haymow so it could drop down into the hay manger along one side of the barn, but the investment of labor pales in comparison to lifting and stacking and lifting again and restacking bales.

In the 1950s, the system was improved in two ways. First, my father and neighbor built a rectangular stack frame out of pipes that could be filled with hay before anyone got into the stack. Once the hay had been packed (by walking around in it), the stack frame was removed and the rest of the stack was built.

Second, my father and that same neighbor built a tractor-pulled stack mover. It was like a large trailer, made of a modified truck axle and wheels, an I-beam frame, steel pipes for the deck and a PTO-driven winch. With that, a stack could be moved from the field to the farmyard, and it could be winched off in front of the barn (or anywhere else). The same grapple fork was then attached to the hay carrier and, piece by piece, the hay in the stack was lifted into the haymow.

For some farmers, there certainly were advantages to baling. Hay could be more easily transported long distances, it could be sold more easily and more hay could be stored in the same amount of barn space. But none of these applied to our farm.

In addition to labor saved, stacking had other advantages. Alfalfa, in particular, could be stacked sooner than it could be baled, and that often reduced the loss of leaves. This system also saved the ongoing expense of buying twine. With a touch of exaggeration, my father would say that baling involved, “buying your own hay back.”
Darrell Jodock – 1600 Riverview Rd., St. Peter, MN 56082

Clell Ballard responds: I’m impressed by the activities of your father and the others you mentioned. That is one of the great things about the American farmer. He is creative as he figures how to do the hard farm work in a more efficient manner.


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