Trailer debacle and an insight

First: the insight.

I come into work this morning and someone asks how I'm doing. I say "terrific" and he says: "your animals must be happy then, you're happy when you're animals are happy".

It's true.

Neat.

The animals are happy because the trailer debacle story ends well. There's a squidgy bit in the middle though, so here it is.

The cold is coming, we're supposed to have -30 the weekend I'm gone. It's been a terrible year for straw here, too wet at cut and apparently also drought and grasshoppers. It's been a bad year for hay for the same reasons. The pigs need a great deal of straw or hay when it's cold, they make a mattress then bury under a layer to use as a blanket. They also go through it, because they eat it.

I'd more-or-less run out of my stash of hay and straw because I'd used it in the new hut I made over Christmas, and for the babies. There was only one guy in town who still had straw, and he had large round bales only. Large round bales are beyond the weight rating of the poor old trailer I've been borrowing from my old boss for grain, so it was time to sort out my brand new enclosed trailer that had been gifted me.

This meant buying a trailer brake controller, a wiring harness, doing some splicing, and buying a new larger hitch ball. Also: getting the old trailer hitch out, testing the new trailer brain, and making sure the whole thing worked. I finally got that done -- money is tight right now, but there really aren't alternatives to these things -- and took off work early yesterday to get down and load up with straw and hopefully drive home before it was completely dark.

Except.

So the trailer is 6x6x12'. The round bales are 5x5.5'.

They do not fit in the trailer door in the back, which has about 4" rim on either side. The guy worked with me a bunch, trying it this direction and that, but we just couldn't make it work. A couple other people came to get straw or hay in the meantime, got loaded up, and we went back to trying to solve this problem but it did not solve.

I guess the round balers have either 4' or 5' chambers, then they just keep rolling the bale bigger until the operator presses the button. This guy has a 5' one and goes to 5.5' width. The ones I'd got before, from someone else, have 4' width and wouldn't have been a problem.

And of course no one else has straw for two hours drive in any direction at least, most people import by the truckload from Alberta right now but I have no tractor to unload if it's trucked in, and I'm leaving in a couple days during a cold spike.

A couple people who picked up while we were trying to fit the thing in thought they might know someone who could transport but couldn't quite make it work. Then someone was talking about getting hay from this guy and the question of big squares came up - that's a bale 3x4x10'. He did have some of those, not straw, but hay. We tried one and it fit in the trailer no problem.

Hay isn't as insulative is straw -- straw is hollow -- and it rots more easily so it's not as good for bedding. It does have more food value though, when the pigs eat it. It turns out they completely love it, too: if you have a sweet tooth imagine being put in a tub full of very good chocolate. They rolled and ate at the same time.

The square bale was also much easier to move by hand than the round bales. It's 1200lbs but, like a smaller bale, it flakes off in sections. Those flakes can be balanced on a wheelbarrow and rolled with a bungee cord around them to carry, like carrying a mattress.

The farmer says he can make me smaller round bales of straw, or square bales of straw, next year. This is the same one I'd originally got grain from, but I'd been seduced away from by the closer grain guy who has a self-loader. The closer guy does an oat and barley only mix though -- no peas, so it's not as good.

So... I guess I'm developing farm relationships out here. I'm going to get my straw custom baled? Although after a winter of hay-candy I may feel bad shifting them back to straw.

Tucker came up and helped me unload so it only took an hour, and by the time we went in last night the pig huts were thigh-deep in fresh hay. The pigs were happy, despite it getting cold enough to drive the geese in at night. And so, as my colleague observed, I'm happy too, and very relieved.

Trailer debacle and an insight

First: the insight.

I come into work this morning and someone asks how I'm doing. I say "terrific" and he says: "your animals must be happy then, you're happy when you're animals are happy".

It's true.

Neat.

The animals are happy because the trailer debacle story ends well. There's a squidgy bit in the middle though, so here it is.

The cold is coming, we're supposed to have -30 the weekend I'm gone. It's been a terrible year for straw here, too wet at cut and apparently also drought and grasshoppers. It's been a bad year for hay for the same reasons. The pigs need a great deal of straw or hay when it's cold, they make a mattress then bury under a layer to use as a blanket. They also go through it, because they eat it.

I'd more-or-less run out of my stash of hay and straw because I'd used it in the new hut I made over Christmas, and for the babies. There was only one guy in town who still had straw, and he had large round bales only. Large round bales are beyond the weight rating of the poor old trailer I've been borrowing from my old boss for grain, so it was time to sort out my brand new enclosed trailer that had been gifted me.

This meant buying a trailer brake controller, a wiring harness, doing some splicing, and buying a new larger hitch ball. Also: getting the old trailer hitch out, testing the new trailer brain, and making sure the whole thing worked. I finally got that done -- money is tight right now, but there really aren't alternatives to these things -- and took off work early yesterday to get down and load up with straw and hopefully drive home before it was completely dark.

Except.

So the trailer is 6x6x12'. The round bales are 5x5.5'.

They do not fit in the trailer door in the back, which has about 4" rim on either side. The guy worked with me a bunch, trying it this direction and that, but we just couldn't make it work. A couple other people came to get straw or hay in the meantime, got loaded up, and we went back to trying to solve this problem but it did not solve.

I guess the round balers have either 4' or 5' chambers, then they just keep rolling the bale bigger until the operator presses the button. This guy has a 5' one and goes to 5.5' width. The ones I'd got before, from someone else, have 4' width and wouldn't have been a problem.

And of course no one else has straw for two hours drive in any direction at least, most people import by the truckload from Alberta right now but I have no tractor to unload if it's trucked in, and I'm leaving in a couple days during a cold spike.

A couple people who picked up while we were trying to fit the thing in thought they might know someone who could transport but couldn't quite make it work. Then someone was talking about getting hay from this guy and the question of big squares came up - that's a bale 3x4x10'. He did have some of those, not straw, but hay. We tried one and it fit in the trailer no problem.

Hay isn't as insulative is straw -- straw is hollow -- and it rots more easily so it's not as good for bedding. It does have more food value though, when the pigs eat it. It turns out they completely love it, too: if you have a sweet tooth imagine being put in a tub full of very good chocolate. They rolled and ate at the same time.

The square bale was also much easier to move by hand than the round bales. It's 1200lbs but, like a smaller bale, it flakes off in sections. Those flakes can be balanced on a wheelbarrow and rolled with a bungee cord around them to carry, like carrying a mattress.

The farmer says he can make me smaller round bales of straw, or square bales of straw, next year. This is the same one I'd originally got grain from, but I'd been seduced away from by the closer grain guy who has a self-loader. The closer guy does an oat and barley only mix though -- no peas, so it's not as good.

So... I guess I'm developing farm relationships out here. I'm going to get my straw custom baled? Although after a winter of hay-candy I may feel bad shifting them back to straw.

Tucker came up and helped me unload so it only took an hour, and by the time we went in last night the pig huts were thigh-deep in fresh hay. The pigs were happy, despite it getting cold enough to drive the geese in at night. And so, as my colleague observed, I'm happy too, and very relieved.