Picking up hay bales with a pitchfork and loading them on a flatbed trailer. Hard manual work that went out of the farmhouse window. That job has been taken over by mighty machinery. These days, only hobbyists seem to take pleasure in handling the pitchfork, especially on hot days.
Here’s some of that mighty machinery at work, late October. The last round of this year’s season for sure.
A John Deere 6155M farm tractor with a Krone Comprima-series round baler. Krone is a major manufacturer of hay and forage equipment from Germany.
A wrapped bale is almost ready for the landing procedure.
There it is, on the right. The next one has just been released from the baling compartment, now wrapper-ready.
And so on. The round bales will get loaded on a flatbed trailer soon, sans pitchforks. The bales would be way too heavy to lift up manually anyway.
Just a few days later I caught another Deere. This one is coupled to a BECO tandem axle dump trailer. The firm that owns this combination is both an agricultural contractor and an earthmoving company, a mixture that has become very common over the past years.
The dump trailer has a payload capacity of 22,000 kg (48,500 lbs), given the number 220 in its model designation. Here’s a similar rig, up-close, a New Holland T7.230 with a BECO Maxxim 260.
Those state-of-the-art four-wheelers, you just can’t keep them down on the farm. They want to hit the road too.
Compare and contrast…
Photo taken circa 1955 on my sister-in-law’s family farm in the Beauce region of Quebec. She was a young girl when the photo was taken.
Wonderful! Any idea what those draft horses are (the breed)?
Sorry, no idea.
Obviously not built for speed!
look a little small for Percheron’s, maybe Friesian?
A Friesian would be pitch-black. The ones in the background might be Belgians, but their legs seem to be too smooth (no long hair on the lower legs).
Maybe a Shire?
The Scania V8 among the draft horses. Or its farm tractor equivalent.
Very cool; thanks for posting this. I’ve seen thousands of these hay bales over the years, but never the machine responsible before.
I live in southern Ontario and here the bales all seem to be wrapped in white plastic. Is there a reason for the difference in colour?
I’ve also seen black, white and a lighter shade of green, but dark green is the most common. Lighter color-shades are better in warm climates.
Never seen baler and wrapper in one before usually separate machines here.