In Basque country (land of my surnames) they have competitions set up around farming chores, or "rural sports", and one of them is scything. It definitely involves endurance, but also strength. I can't wait for the next video! Thanks Pa Mac.

We've taken hay with a scythe on our small farm. And used the same scythe to mow paths, clear land of rushes, brambles, nettles and bring it into good grassland, and made hay wildflower meadows. I used a scythe, one winter, to mow maybe ten acres or rushy weedy land. Raking the overgrown rushes and piling them into ricks to rot down for field compost was a lot more work than mowing. We use a two wheeled tractor now. With a sickle bar mower. But the scythe is sharp, and I try to take my smallest hay field with it each year. Mow along fencelines and under electruc fences with it. And take it out when I want to hear the sounds of the natural world I;m working in. It's a great tool. Good for the body heart and mind to use. Thanks for the video, the ideas, and the ispiration to sharpen it up and get back at it.

It’s always a good day when Farmhands Companion posts a new video!!! Love it! We used to play bailing hay in our little wagon after dad mowed the yard with the lawn clippings. Afterwards, we would haul our “bails” to the pasture and feed the cows. 😂

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

You, too, huh?

A combination of two things which bring me great pleasure in life, meadows and farm hands companion!

Great video. Love the return to form. Good scything!

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

Thank you, Marshall

Looking forward to the rest of this

I don't have animals that need hay, but I hay for compost. Around here alfalfa grows wild. I mow the alfalfa with a scyth and rake it up. It makes hot compost. I've been figuring it out on my own so this will be very helpful for me.

I knew there was a special rake for gathering field hay, now I know a lot more. Thanks Pa!

I scythe my family's hillside meadow. Something I still struggle with is when to cut and how long to leave the grass to dry. I try to cut it before a good rain, as it's better for the grass roots, but I've read that the rain can damage the hay. I look forward to Part 2.

@EthanPDobbins

Жыл бұрын

Hay takes away nutritional value and makes it harder to dry. It needs sun, heat, and to be obviously dry when you're done. Getting rained on immediately after cutting hurts it far less tha rain after it's begun to dry

I could play ur soundtrack everyday lol. So calming and has the perfect rhythm

Great video, would love a video with you talking and going over the tools needed for making hay on the homestead. We have a small 6 acre homestead with a dairy cow, and hay is something I have to buy in. Keep up the good work!

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

I think you'll enjoy the new video then, Rip: kzread.info/dash/bejne/Z4autshwkcunlKg.html

@ripdinecola4755

Жыл бұрын

@@farmhandscompanion Awesome can't wait to check it out! I love the tool videos! Thanks

My mom and her oldest sisters used to get 'farmed out' during harvest season to cook for all the farmers that got together at each other's farm for harvesting. I loved when she told me about how things worked on a farm, she was driving a 4 horse team of work horses when she was 10 years old, I even have a photo of it. I wish we could go back to simpler times.

Dad talked about their cutting hay on steep hillsides here. Said they had a sled type hauler to get it back to the barn.

Thanks for a look back and possibly to the future Pa Mac . This was a great video for folks to see. Stay safe and keep up the great work and videos that are enjoyed by all. Fred.

Great video! I love the illustrations. Waiting for the rain to stop here!

Great video! Interesting and educational…as usual. Always enjoyable. Thank you!

Great channel, wonderful content!

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

Thank you, George

In many european countrys to cut back cost and boost ecology they are turning back to hayfields (Mown 2x per year) rather than keep large open lawns everywhere on public lands. The flowers growing in between the gras is a sight to behold. But often they do it on places not easy accesible with heavy tractors. So they turn to 2stroke bruscutters. I use a scythe there and i am often quicker than they are. The gras also heals quicker and in a somewhat bussier urban area not lossing your hearing is a great plus.

Great video! Thank you for making these!

Thank you so much!

Love this video!!

The Simplicity brand garden/lawn tractor used to have a sickle bar mower attachment . How I wish that were something I could have! Cutting I think will be the hard part. I live on extreme hills so raking my windrows down hill should be less labor. I have my plans for a manual box baler. While not as low input as your method, it is a method where I wouldn't have to count on family or neighbors for work days. (It makes them whine!)

❤This channel!

Love it. Days of old, are good to hold. 👨‍🌾

I dare say that wooden pitchfork is iconic to your intro, could pa Mac go into detail on how it's constructed?

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

It's on the list of tools, Timothy. Thank you for watchin'

Grandfather farmed in Sicily in early 1900s. He told me how they used to cut wheat by hand. I don’t recall if he said they used sickles or scythes. Hay is less of an issue there because the grass is green in the winter and they have few beef cows.

TY

Thank you for this video. "Primitive tools" is such a loaded term with many negative connotations. Maybe 'efficient' or 'sustainable' would be a better way to describe scythe, hay rake and pitch fork?

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

"Primitive" in the antique reselling world simply means tools or devices that are no longer modern. (not caveman tools or anything).

I can't hardly rake hay this year due to many hornets' nests in the stubble. I see many small grey nests about 4-5 inches in diameter. I never saw so many. Plus, I got stung 6 times by black, rectangular hornets in the leaves in the woods. 😬

Come on out I’ve got a hay meadow in need of mowing!

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

I'll just watch Michael do it. And please tell him to add me to the list of hay buyers for 2023. (Best baled hay in southwest Arkansas!)

Kocham twoje filmy Pozdrowienia z Polski ❤🇵🇱

My grandpa taught me to cut hay with a scythe, and to make haystacks when I was in highschool. He was in his 80's and just about killed myself trying to keep up, but 70 years of experience that didn't have. 🤣😂🤣 I'm in my 50's and still cut hay with a scythe, and put it up loose. The hay you cut was way past it's prime.

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

Yes, I know; but you film when you can, there John.

il ove the insurance of the angle to be cut on the sythe.

Thanks Pa Mac! So do you just cut whatever grass is growing in the field or are you scything something you planted? Do you have to keep out thistles,etc?

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

Great question, Lane. (I'm gonna answer it on my new question and answer show, comin' up in just a few weeks, so stay tuned for that) Thanks for watchin' as always!

A scythe, hayrake, wheelbarrow and 100x100-footer dedicated hay plot feeds my behind-the-garage Rabbitry that produces 400+ pounds of delicious protein... for the entire Winter. Summertime they are tractored around the property feeding on pasture, lawn, and weeds while we collect hay 3 times a season from that 100-footer plot. The Winter feed mix is 60% Hay, 20% leaf (autumn leaf fall raked up, dried comfrey hay, tree hay) 10% winter stored tuber/root (sweet potato, sunchoke, fodder beet, and the like) and 10% commercially produced feed . pellet. Without the free hay, feed costs would make the whole operation financially untenable. Better off just buying cheaper meats at your grocer. The neighbors like to poke fun at me & my scythe ... but we know what's what here. My scythe cost me $200. Their tractor (and tools/implements) cost them several hundred times more than that.

Never could understand why folks congregate together with strangers at a gym, all sweat and grow stinkier by the minute together and pay good money to do it when there's probably work at home that could produce better results and not break the bank.

Blessed is God Almighty the Creator, Giver of Life Who created cattle that give us meat, milk, leather, gelatin, and labor . . . and they survive and thrive for half a year on what? Dry, dead grass. People either see the miracle or they don't.

@farmhandscompanion

Жыл бұрын

Well said!

Oh, the agony, pain and misery of using an American or British scythe! The job is four times easier with a European scythe, such as a Fux or Falci. That grass would have been so much better, if cut 6 weeks earlier in its lush green prime. But yes, handmade hay is a glorious thing.