—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, May 21, 1977 22 First hay good 9 but quantity down LANCASTER - Hay continues to sell well at Lancaster County auctions even as the new crop is beginning to come off the fields. Demand is good. Prices are steady to strong. The new crop of hay, according to reports by farmers, is generally good, although a few thin spots are around. Here’s what 11 farmers in southeastern Pennsylvania and two spokesmen at hay auctions had to say: CHESTER COUNTY Bill Moore, Cochranville, had 150 of his 450 acres of alfalfa harvested as of Wednesday evening when a thunderstorm accompanied by gusty winds swept across much of the southeastern area. “The crop looks real good and we’re about five days ahead of schedule ” Moore told this reporter in a telephone interview. He was putting all of his crop in as haylage at 65 per cent moisture and estimated he was getting yields of seven tons per acre. “I’d say we’re 99 per cent bug free,” he continued, “there’s hardly any weevil damage, but we do have some leaf miners and spittle bugs.’’ His hay fields are mostly a combination of alfalfa and grass, with newer seedings looking better than older established fields. Moore con sidered his first cutting to be normal, despite the early start. In establishing new fields, he likes to seed about half of his strips in the Fall, the other half in the Spring. Donald Snader, a freshman at Lancaster Mennonite High School, describes the crop at his home farm as “pretty good.” He’s the son of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Snader, Parkesburg. The family had put up a few acres of alfalfa as hay as early this week. Yields, he said, are about the same as last year, considering the age of the strips. Bug damage was low, although some spraying was done as a precautionary measure. Arthur Hershey, Cochranville, will begin cutting his first crop early next week. He reports his newly established fields look thick and tall, but older strips are getting thin. “The new fields which I planted last year look great,” the Chester County dairyman said. He also noted that seedings established on March 28 of this year look fine and that they got a good start while soil moisture levels were still favorable. Like nearly everyone else in the southeastern portion of the state, Hershey could use some rain to keep his crops moving ahead. As of the middle of this week, Hershey was not aware of weevils in his fields, but he has noticed a substantial infestation of bugs in clover especially. He’ll have about 70 acres of clover and alfalfa to put in and prefers to begin cutting in the early bud stage. The bugs were getting into Ernest Miller’s fields so he went ahead and cut before the damage occurred. He has about 350 acres of hay in the Hamburg area, with 40 to 45 acres cut as of Wednesday. Reporting that his crop had no flowers on it as of Wednesday evening, he added that “it was close to it.” His seedings are a mixture of alfalfa and orchard grass. He’s not sure yet about spraying, saying that he doesn’t like to resort to it any more than be has to. Otherwise the crop looks pretty good. Frank Darcey, cattleman from the Fairfield area, reports that his stands of alfalfa are exceptionally good this year. Orchard grass is good too. Fescue and alsike clover aren’t so good, though. “We have lots of weevils in this area,” he told Lancaster Farming, “but the further west you go, up to the mountain, the bugs aren’t so bad. I guess it’s because of the higher elevation and possibly because it’s cooler.” Bugs in the area are bad enough to have warranted aerial spraying. Reports of bad in festations of weevils in that section of Pennsylvania, as well as neighboring Maryland had been passed on to this reporter by others as well. Darcey, who in the past two weeks has made two trips to northern Virginia, says the first cutting in Maryland is 75 per cent completed. Eyeballing it from the road, he says the first crop looks real good and bug activity isn’t bad either. “But it’s dry as a bone around here, we need rain badly,” he concluded. LANCASTER COUNTY Irwin Engle, Maytown, ran out of feed for his cows, so he began cutting some of his alfalfa. He says he would not normally be cutting yet. Engle expects a good year for hay, assuming, of course, that the weather cooperates. His stands of alfalfa, particularly newer seedings, look really good he says and he hasn’t noticed any damage yet from tiie freezing and thawing action which normally occurs. “Fields remained frozen for most of the winter and that meant we didn’t have the roots jacked up like in some other > ears,” he explained. As for bugs, Engle says they haven’t arrived yet, “but they’ll come because they’re around in older established fields in the area.” He makes all of his hay into haylage. Earl Weaver, New Holland area dairyman, reports that his fields look “real good” and that bugs hadn’t been noticed at all until the recent hot weather arrived. I’m looking for a really good season because we got such an early start,” he said, crediting the warm weather for the thus far fine hay season. Down in the Willow Street area, Raymond Witmer and his sons are ui the middle of their first cutting. “It’s not a heavy crop this year,” the Guernsey breeder commented. “There are no bugs of any account, and we aren’t spraying yet,” he continued. While quantity is down, Vv itme- acknowledged that quality was high. His cuttings v _rr [i iing off young and leafy. With 80 acres of haylage o make, he likes to start a bit early in order to not ♦h stands which get too mature His alfalfa v\ a ’age when he cut it Monday ‘I believe it’s By DIETER KRIEG BERKSCOUNTY ADAMS COUNTY the prettiest alfalfa ever,” but there’s not as much of it as in some other years,” he concluded. Paul Hively, Brogueville, is doubtful of a strong crop this year unless a few showers encourage growth a bit. Nevertheless, he says alfalfa doesn’t look bad at all so far. Clover doesn’t amount to much so far, however, he related. “We’ve had too many cool and dry periods; on an average I don’t believe it’s going to be quite as good a crop as in other years,” he said. Bugs have arrived to com plicate matters. Robert Kilgore of Airville says his alfalfa was about knee-high and looks pretty good in general. His clover and - timothy, however, are lacking in height. There are some' bugs in the fields, but they aren't bad yet, he said. In festations are pretty much limited to older fields, while new stands are still free of the pests. LEBANON COUNTY According to Hershey Bare, there’ll be a lighter crop of hay this year than we’ve had for the last couple of years. The Lebanon area farmer bases that decision on what he’s found in the field so for. Bare is quick to point out though that the crop “isn’t poor or anything like that, but it isn’t excellent either, that’s for sure.” His fields aren’t infested with bugs and he’s not expecting many due to the cold weather this past Winter. Like nearly everywhere else in southeastern Penn sylvania, hay in Lebanon County was cut a bit earlier than usual this year. Bare said be doesn’t normally cut his first crop until the last week in May. He noted that some of his neighbors had baled hay this last Monday and described their quality as “A-l.” Bare’s main concern is the weather. He blames a relatively dry Spring for the shorter crop and is afraid the hay market could really be hurting this Winter if rains don’t arrive soon. For post-emergence weed control on com... Donverheibicide... ...clone or tank-mixed with 2,4-D (depending on your weed problem): ...to control tough, Icte germinoting broadleaf weeds. ...to cover misses of pre-emergence herbicide application, ...to get control where weather or other factors make earlier application impossible. YORKCOUNTY pennfleldcofporatton 711 Rohrerstown Road Lancaster, Pennsylvania 17604 Robert Frame of the Vintage Sales Stables shares the concern over a short crop this year. He makes that assessment on the basis of activities at the auction, as well as an evaluation of the stands on his Chester County farm, near Downingtown. “All my hay fields just aren’t what they ought to be,” the auctioneer said. New seedings are good, other strips aren’t quite up to par. “The weather is pretty hard on it, but the bugs aren’t established yet,” Frame revealed. His hay sales don’t have the volume of other auctions in Lancaster County, but demand is strong and prices are unexpectedly high for this time of year. Good hay is in especially high demand. No new hay has arrived at his auction yet. New Holland Sales Stables, which has upwards of 100 loads of hay on hand for many sales during peak buying seasons, had the first load of new hay come in this week. Norman Kolb told Lancaster Farming that it was “ex ceptionally nice.” He expects new hay to be coming in from now on. Over half of the hay coming through the Stables is sold locally, but some does go into neighboring states. Demand is very good, with prices still coming close to $lOO and even'over that. Many loads fetch $BO and up. New Holland had 78 loads on hand this past week. Prices were comparable to those paid last Winter, Kolb said, and although two Iqads brought more than $lOO per ton, . demand was strong enough to sell more at that price if the quality had been there. “We’re not getting as much fancy hay now as we did before,” Kolb grplain^. Five or six years ago, Kolb reminisced, auctions didn’t sell hardly any hay during the hay-making season. It’s a different ballgame now, as this week’s 78 loads would indicate. Hay seems to be a crop which is still very much in demand. ...to moke sure that late weeds cannot mature to become the nursery for next year's weed crop. AUCTION BRIEFS Ask us for application details about Danvel herbicide... from Velsicol. Note: Before using any pesticide, read the label. ■e*'
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