Hay on a small scale

We have about 3 acres of seasonally wet meadow that mostly grows grass mixed with other things. It is not in any way a seeded hayfield but the mix of species would be appreciated by our goats. We don’t graze them there directly as the fence is not goat-tight or dog-tight and it shares a fenceline with the neighbours garden and dogs. We’re considering cutting it for hay but don’t have haying equipment for the tractor and it’s not in the budget for this year. Buying used haying equipment is difficult here in part because few people make hay but also because our tractor is too small to run most older equipment.

Considering cutting with a scythe, drying, and stacking loose in a shipping container. This seems like the ideal solution to me except for the time involved, considering the million other things that need to be done here.  

I feel like the mowing part of this would be the most time consuming. None of us are good at scything yet. There is no one nearby we could hire to come in with a hay cutter and we don’t have a mower. There is a BCS available to rent but it has a flail mower. I understand those cut too small for baling hay but do they work for loose hay? And how small is the cut anyway? Are we talking something really finely chopped like a mulching mower?

Another option is to make a homemade baler out of a wooden box or a square wheelie bin, which are both shown on Youtube. I have never used loose hay, only baled. Since we are only planning bay for our own use, it seems that baling might be an unnecessary step.

For storage, we’ve been using a shipping container for purchased bales for years and it works well to keep them dry through the rainy winter.  Should we put a layer of pallets on the floor for added circulation for loose hay?

Thoughts on all of this, or personal experiences/ cautionary tales?

Oh, I had another question. How long would it take to mow 3 acres with a walk behind BCS if we decided the flail mower would be appropriate equipment to cut hay. Would this be a day-rental or multiple days?

I can't help you with the flail mower part, but I can tell you, I bought a scythe a while back.  I've only used it a few times and I'm not good with it, but I can mow a large area in a surprising small amount of time.  Depending on how far you have to go to rent the mower, you can probably scythe it faster.

I let the grass grow tall, mow it in a way that kicks it into rows, and then go over it with a pull-behind lawn sweeper to collect it. I use this for mulch, but I think you could use the same technique and equipment for small scale hay without a huge investment. Lots of labor though, since it would require manual baling.

If like Matt suggested, let the grass dry thoroughly then use a lawn sweeper and dump the sweeper into the goat yard or into storage containers.

Thank you, some helpful ideas there.

Yes, it is possible it would be quicker to scythe (even with minimal scything skills) than to pick up a rental mower that could function in the rather lumpy field.

I had to look up what a lawn sweeper was. It might not work here as the field is not very lawn-like. Not smooth, I mean. It might eventually be possible but in the first year or two there would definitely be bumpy terrain and probably a lot of cut off brush and rocks. This field as far as I know has never been hayed; it was a horse pasture years ago.

When I searched lawn sweeper and hay it took me to a manufacturer’s site which stated it does not pick up hay. So not good for the longer scythed pieces (but supposedly good scythers should be able to drop the cut hay more or less in a row) but I bet it would work brilliantly for flail-mowed shorter pieces of grass to be picked up from an actual hayfield or lawn type surface and stored loose. A lot quicker than raking those up, for sure, and you’d leave less of it behind.

Look up "bush hog mower" or "rotary mower". There are many widths, wide and narrower. With a small tractor you'd probably want a 5'. They come either with three-point hitch or pto driven pull behind, with two, height adjustable, wheels. You can often find them used. ~~Then the trick is to take off the bolted on, or if necessary cut off, the (passenger side) right side, side plate. With the side off, the hay is cut and trapped under the mower just long enough to crimp the long stems of grass, and throw it out the side. The grass/hay doesn't get cut into smaller pieces. The crimping helps the hay to dry faster.

Let the hay dry a day or two, then use pitch forks to pick it up. At times I have loaded the hay into a manure spreader, or a hay wagon, for transport to barn. When you can afford it, later on, get a hay rake. Side delivery rakes tend to be numerous where horses used to be used. They work fine for small operations. And with smaller tractors. Some side delivery rakes have a lever to switch it over to ted with. That means the tines rotate backwards so that when you rake with it, it turns the hay over so it dries faster, without raking it into windrows.

Make sure your hay is dry before putting it in a more tightly sealed space, or it can mold or even self-combust. Check around any older farms for older equipment they might have that they don't use any more. Also, you might want to volunteer at any hay making farms so you can learn some about what to do.

~~~I used a bush hog for years before I finally moved up to a hay bine. I made tens of thousands of bales. And sold many of them to happy customers. The rest I fed to my cattle.

P.S. Because bush hogs are height adjustable, "lumpy"/uneven fields never mattered to me or my equipment.