Steve NW WI
Unwanted Riff Raff.
That reminds me of throwing bales as a kid. When you got out of the barn if felt like air conditioning. Funny how dad switched to round bales once my brother and I moved out.
Scott
(quote edited to run in the time allotted) It was so hot I had a case of the couldn't think straight rampaging stoopids.
small bales. Back in my 20s worked on a big dairy, he used all small bales...yep, that got to be a lot like work, luckily it was up in Maine and never got that hot. Our record I remember was we cracked over ten thousand stacked in the barn in one day.
There is NO WAY IN HECK FIRE I could do that sort of work today with small square bales by hand and with a bale hook.
We do big, 3/4 ton, big round bales here, whenever the baler is working. .
Y'all (and this flippin heat) are bringing back old memories, that ain't all good. I spent many a day up in the haymow as a kid, it bought my first few cars and trucks. Baling straw about this time of year was always the worst, seemed like the oats had to come off on the hottest dang day of the year.
As far as the rampaging stoopids go, I once broke the cardinal rule of never get off the tractor with the PTO running. It was 90+ and I'd been baling for a few hours on an open tractor, with not nearly enough fluids. I'd already had to change a flat on the baler and one on a wagon, so my day was not going well already. The knotter on the baler started acting up, and after about 5 looksees with the PTO off, and nothing I noticed wrong, I decided I was gonna trip the knotter while it was running and see what I could see when it tied. I had the tractor idled down, went back to trip it, decided I might could see better from the twine side, stepped over the wagon tongue, and WHAM - the baler found a bit of hay, the knotter tripped, the thrower kicked the bale (Deere pan thrower), and I wound up in the front of the wagon with a whole lot of body parts that hurt and a pair of glasses that were not found until the wagon was unloaded. To this day, I'm convinced that had the tractor been at PTO speed instead of idling, I'd be permanently disabled or dead.
The boss's brother pulled into the field with an empty wagon right about then, and we shut down and went for a little trip to the hospital to get checked out. A couple quick x-rays made sure nothing was broken, and spent the night with IV's to get rehydrated. Doc said I was well into heat exhaustion and close to heat stroke.
Moral of the story, when you start having trouble trying to keep focused on your job or getting sloppy due to heat, give up for the day, get some fluids in ya, and cool off. It might just keep ya around a while longer.
Just to keep it a WEE TINY BIT on topic, I might have to bring the saws in from the shed and put them in the air conditioned basement. I feel bad for em.