We have been lucky in our corner of West Wales to have had just enough rain to keep the grass growing combined with enough sun to make the hay making flow.
We pretty much filled the barns with the crop from our early top meadow so most of the crop from Cae Mari Jones has gone onto an outdoor haystack.
Occasionally we get a long spell of settled weather when we can make hay at full pace. Our early hay making was like this, with about 1.5 acres in the barn by the end. Right now we are in a patch of unsettled weather, a few dry days interspersed
Back in August we spent an enjoyable day with Andrew from Coast and Country (ITV Wales), talking about scything and hand hay making. The piece will be going out this Friday 14th October at 8pm on ITV Wales. If you live outside of Wales, the programme will be available at
Following on from good grass growing conditions in the spring we are doing well with our hay harvest. A heavier crop per acre combined with pushing the making during a good spell of weather in June means that the stacks have been pretty much full for a couple of weeks
Whilst mowing this morning both Phil and I were sharpening more frequently than usual to keep our blades mowing well – time for a peen. Here is Phil working on my 75cm Profisense ready for tomorrow morning’s mowing. Permaculture Magazine are featuring an article by us on peening in their
National Meadows Day last Sunday saw us spending a fair part of the day out in one of the Trust’s meadows, saving the hay. This is grass that was cut in the rain on our last scythe course. We would not normally choose to cut hay in such weather, but
We sneaked in a bit of hay making in the last little patch of good weather. The hay, cut on Wednesday morning, was racked last night to protect it from the showers that arrived over night. I didn’t get any photos, but have come across this interesting film from 1942,
This last week of beautiful weather has given us a good start on the seasons hay making. Phil has mowed every morning from Saturday 28th May until Friday 3rd June. The cut grass has been spread and rowed daily, taking about 3.5 days to dry. The first hay was bought
It’s a weekend of firsts – we had our first beginners scythe course of the season yesterday and we started the first hay making of the year. Phil also found the first orchids in the hay field. The first was in bud……. and the second was starting to open. The beauty
We are pleased to be stocking traditional British-made wooden rakes from Rudd’s rake factory in Cumbria. Light and strong they are used for many purpose, including raking gravel, collecting autumn leaves and, of course, haymaking. Below is a lovely little video that gives a taste of the family firm, and here
What a beautiful week of summer we have just had. Autumn activities were put on hold and we grabbed the opportunity to make hay while the sun shone. The shorter Autumn days meant we were often working out in the fields at sunset, sometimes finishing rowing up in the dark.
The late summer weather has not been easy haying weather. If we waited for 4 or 5 days of sunny weather in a row, as is commonly suggested as needed for hay making, we wouldn’t have made much! In fact, there have only been two occasions which might qualify