The 2019 hay season is shaping up to be a rather challenging one with the seemingly endless rain and lower temperatures across most of the nation.

Agriculture is one of the most important professions you could choose, but it can be unfriendly at times. Commodity prices are often inconsistent, weather patterns are unstable, markets can be volatile, and labor is growing scarce. With so many factors outside of your control, it’s understandable to want predictability and productivity.

If you have been actively farming for as long as I have, you have seen more than a few changes in the machinery we use. Today’s farm machinery is more powerful, faster, “smarter” and more comfortable than ever before. To be fair, they are also more complicated and expensive.

As you work to provide a consistent ration to your cows at the same time each and every day, the mixing operation is critical to your success. Today, I want to talk about getting the feed mixed and some of the factors that affect the quality of mix.

Have you even been looking for a bolt, found what you thought was the correct bolt, only to find it would not thread up? Or have you ever looked at the top of a bolt and wondered what those numbers or lines meant?

When you wake up in the morning, you have two jobs that must be done regardless of everything else – you need to get your cows milked, and you must get them fed. Everything else can be put on hold to ensure these two activities are completed.

Good help is hard to find … and those words are true in just about any industry you can imagine. Whether you are looking for a farm mechanic or a high-school basketball referee, a qualified person who is skilled, punctual and affordable is an elusive creature indeed.

We all know how expensive equipment is today. I often think back to the economic boom that was the 1970s in the dairy industry. One of my professors at Virginia Tech, the late William Etgen, called the ’70s the “Golden Age of Dairying,” and part of the outward signs of the truth of that term was the expansion of our equipment line on my home farm.

Variable-speed engines power almost all self-propelled vehicles and equipment. The correct engine speed, as revolutions per minute (rpm), will be the best compromise considering economy of operation, emissions, power needed (or speed needed, especially when running PTO-powered implements such as hay balers) and longevity of the engine.