Big Hollow Haying

I don’t consider myself a “tractor driving mama”. When I signed on with Lorin in 1974, I don’t remember seeing that item in the job description anywhere. I do remember on the list: bake bread and ski, which I have accomplished. However, when three sons and three daughters have moved onto other endeavors and there are only the twins left to help on the farm I am, at times, pressed into service.
Today it was baling hay. I climb up into the 12,745 lb. John Deere 4450, 140 horse-power, diesel turbo charged tractor, with a compression ratio of 15:8:1 (I don’t know what that means but it is true and it sounds good) and try and refresh my memory as to how to drive this green monster. Let’s see, brakes, throttle, PTO, hydraulic lift, clutch and shut-off. All of those other gizmos, gauges and gadgets I don’t expect to use. I function best on the KISS program, Keep It Simple Sweetheart. That's what I expect at the end of the day also.
Let me say that on a flat square field I am a really good baler. I can make the baler track those windrows spitting out nice tight bales in nice straight rows and leave a field looking as orderly as my mother’s vegetable garden. But today we are in Big Hollow and true to its name it is anything but flat and square. It gets the prize for being the most irregular piece on the farm. It has stands of quaking aspen, boulders hidden in deep grass, slopes with grades of up to 30% (I checked that on the GPS) and pieces of antique machinery that should be registered with the National Historical Society and hauled off to decorate someone’s yard, someone who likes pieces of rusted, mangled machinery to grow their marigolds around.
Now I surmise that when the big glacier that formed this hollow melted its way down from the Tetons it was thinking more of beauty than ease of farming because beautiful it is, with the Tetons reigning over it on their throne to the east. But as with other beautiful things, they may be pretty to look at but must be handled with care. A farmer has to be very creative in swathing, baling and hauling lest he find himself and his machine rolling from the top to the bottom. Because of this creativity the windrows don’t all just go east and west, they go east and west where it is gently rolling hills but where it gets steep they go up and down the hill north and south and where there is an obstacle to go around they go any which way.
The words of caution I received from my farmer (that’s farmer not former) husband were, “Dear, bale the same direction that it was swathed, keep it in a low gear and don’t put the clutch in when you are going down the hill.”
Keep in mind that the swather that cuts and folds the hay into windrows has a nice tight turning radius, not so with a tractor that has a 106” wheelbase pulling a baler. To compound the challenge, usually the first outside rounds are baled and hauled allowing a place to turn without having to dodge bales as you change directions at the end of the row. But that hadn’t happened yet on this field and the “dear” in the driver’s seat isn’t sure how the “deere” is going to do.
I start out on the easier, top of the hill, back and forth rows to get my “deere legs” so to speak. Here I can bask in the comforts of my air conditioned cab with an unparalleled view of the Tetons and watch a hawk as he dives in on an unsuspecting field mouse and then glides off to enjoy his afternoon snack. But when I move to the slopes I have to have full concentration on controlling this mammoth machine so as not to end up as one more piece of mangled metal to work around. I feel more in control going up the hill than coming down, but what goes up must come down. Oh, dear!!! I decide this is not unlike riding a roller coaster at a slow lumbering speed, but if I did put the clutch in I could throw my hands over my head and yell “Wheeeeeeee!” I soon found out on the next down that even in the lowest gear with the clutch engaged I can get that same “Wheeeeeee” adrenaline rush. All of the sudden that tractor had a mind of its own and it was like a horse heading for the stables after a hard day’s ride. I was hanging on hoping to make it to the bottom, bouncing and jouncing all the way. I baled parts of several different swaths on the way down but only what was in my way because there was no turning to pick and choose. I pretty much had to give the “deere his head”. Whew! I wonder what the G-force of that ride was and how much air I got.
Once at the bottom I had to square myself back in the saddle of that “deere” and go up again, this time coming down a different direction, I had to let that tractor know who was in charge. When my older son showed up on the four-wheeler with the world’s cutest grandson who wanted to ride in the tractor, I invited my son to finish that slope. He said you have to put it into four wheel drive when you go down. Excuse me, did my farmer (getting closer to former) husband tell me that? Oh, that’s what that gizmo is for!!! My son finished the slope and then I climbed back in to finish the field with my grandson by my side. Maybe that makes me a “Tractor Driving Grandma”.