Broke in a hay virgin tonight.

[riderinthestorm]

Those of you with horses, or any livestock know what I mean. A semi load of 800 bales of hay, 60 - 80 lbs each, to be unloaded from the truck, shifted onto the elevator, and put up into the loft of the barn. We go through 30 bales/day so we get a LOT of hay at our farm on a regular basis but my daughter's new 16 yr old boyfriend wanted to work alongside her putting it up.

He arrived in sport shorts with his undies showing, a tee shirt, sneakers.

I outfitted him in a long sleeve shirt, a pair of my husband's old sweats, gloves, and a bottle of water. He was skeptical even as she assured him he didn't look like a "dork" in all his essential gear.

3 hours later he manned up, rode the hay wagon down to the mare barn (even as he was exhausted and shocked by the sheer amount of physical labor he'd just endured), and shakily pitched the chaff out into their shed lot.

He has some hay burns on his wrists where the tee shirt rode up, some blisters. But he worked steadily the entire 3 hours. I've had lesser "men" quit. I presume seeing his girlfriend (my daughter), and me, and her dad, work as hard as the three other Mexicans sent some steel up his spine.

He sat on the hay rack afterwards with the rest of us drinking beers and water and Pepsi out of the cooler I'd set up in the morning, a soft suburban kid, shocked into rural life.

I know its a cliche but you can really take the measure of a person by doing physical labor alongside them for an hour or two or three.

He wants to be an ER doctor.

Maybe he really has the stuff inside to do that. Regardless, he did good tonight.

[MuseRider]

1. There is nothing I hate more

than hay days. Oh how I hate the pulling down, stacking on a trailer, driving, unstacking, dragging and stacking hay. I hate it with a passion I save only for HAY DAY!

Still, would not trade my way of life for anything even though I have to do hay day

[riderinthestorm]

2. Yeah, and its 58 today in Northern IL today. Broke him in easy since its not 95 in July!

[Kennah]

3. I read the subject and thought of Groucho

Where's all these farmers' daughters I've been hearing about for years?

[HarveyDarkey]

4. To really test his mettle

Let him help with the straw, if you have it. I started helping baling (at 11 years old) & got used to standing on that pitching wagon behind the baler. After grabbing & stacking straw (yes, the long sleeves are REALLY necessary), hay was nothing.
Of course there was the time, when I was in the mow unloading, that a bale broke open with a nest of bumblebees inside. I've never moved faster in my life, they were angry.

[riderinthestorm]

8. He's a lucky boy and will escape handling straw with me. We get shavings delivered by the semi-load

The company simply drops the entire truck at the farm and leaves it, we use so much for bedding!

[Downwinder]

5. Sure wish I had that $12 a ton alfalfa we bailed in the 1950s.

[HopeHoops]

6. Good for him!

[HopeHoops]

7. Well, I thought this might just be appropriate...

Listen closely to the lyrics. It's really funny, but touches well on the reality.

[riderinthestorm]

9. Damn cute!

"Better get on your boots and join us.... Down on the farm"


I actually wear RUNNING shoes 90% of the time I'm working. I didn't even try to offer him different footwear. He came in his stylish sneakers and I just shook my head. We had a lot of rain in N. IL yesterday but since he wasn't going to be getting down in the muck I just let that go....

[HopeHoops]

14. "Slip out the back way with Nellie the barmaid (OOhh-waaa) to the woods..."

I love that line.

[warrior1]

10. I just read you post then click on out local news site and this was the front page story. Ouch

http://www.kcra.com/news/local-news/news-sacramento/Big-rig-overturns-dumps-hay-onto-southbound-I-5/-/12969376/16992458/-/jg7p36/-/index.html

[Brother Buzz]

11. I remember my first time bucking straw

This city slicker was positioned alone on one side of the trailer, bucking a zig-zag row of bales. I was really hurting toward the end of that first row, as the stack grew higher and higher. After that first row, it was pointed out I was bucking two rows instead of one. Silly me. It got easier after that, but it was still, hard, honest work.

[libodem]

12. Be glad the bales

Weren't 75-100lbs. Maybe that's just what they used to feel like. I stacked hay in my 20's when I lived on a cow-calf ranch, with my first husband.

I loved those newborn babies..

[tk2kewl]

13. I used to like hay days... but I was a strapping young man back in those days.

only made $50 a day as a groom, but it was fun

[Taverner]

15. Sounds like he's got the mojo for ER work...

Good luck to him!

[GeorgeGist]

16. ER docs are Cowboys ...

in their own right.

[applegrove]

17. I remember doing that. I was the sole person on the ground unloading

the wagon and putting the bales on the elevator into the barn. What a workout.

[Kali]

18. mwahahahhaha fun!

we don't use much hay, I get 10 or 13 tons in the summer (about all barn will hold) and I usually end up buying from the feed store before the next summer's crop is ready (ouch THAT can be painful)

nothing like racing to unload a flat before the hoards of scroungers show up and try to get at the lower layers or a storm rolls in.

I can remember the Mexican truckers and their crews with the elevator as a kid but since we moved to the ranch we did it by hand. Well the last 4 or 5 years my sons have done it by hand. ahhhh payback for a small amount of that food!

the last few years our road has been so bad we have just been hauling 40 or 50 bales at a time in the stock trailer. THAT makes the job seem like cake since it is covered and has solid walls. One or two loads a day is pretty easy to face for a week or so. this year we got 100 bales of alfalfa and 200 of wheat.