[dominiquer60]

Donn I love your nets and I would make use of our baling twine in this manner, if the ear gnats were not so vicious here. The Cashels with ears have really cut back on the head rubbing and therefore less line hang ups and bridles coming off. They fit right under the bridle well and wash easy. I may make a couple anyway, our blue twine may be a real fashion statement 🙂

[dominiquer60]

I found, by luck, a large fly bonnet at a feed store, and haven’t found another that size since. I bought a few of the cashel black masks with ears here http://www.drafttack.com/page11.html. I really like these better than the crocheted bonnets for driving and riding.

[dominiquer60]

First 23 acres are chopped and in the neighbors silo in trade for planting our corn. Sam is out tedding the first 5 acres for small squares, we need it badly for the horses. It is drying nicely though we are working it more that we normally would because the ground is so wet, but it is drying on schedule for baling tomorrow. It is almost 80 today and should be in the mid 80’s tomorrow. 36 last night, and I just planted tomatoes this morning, warm nights from here on out.

[dominiquer60]

In our quest to figure out what we want for a front sidebacker lazy strap, we discovered a use for a heavy duty strap.

We have been using what ever straps are around and long enough to keep front traces from dragging, and lone enough to let the better fitted harness do its thing regarding taking weight off the collar. One set of straps is a pair of cow neck straps that I had for my steers when they were smaller. They are at least 1.5″ wide and triple thick with a roller buckle and a D ring. These came in rather handy today after we packed up a pair with plow, disk and stone boat to plow for a blueberry patch the next town over. We brought everything that we thought that we would need extra evener, bridle, lines, etc. But we forgot the jockey yokes 🙁 We did not want to go back, so we proceeded to use the cattle collars that were on one harness, a couple extra hame straps and a pair of heavy duty double snaps to rig the horse collars to the neck yoke. We put a cattle neck strap thru both lazy strap rings and used a hame strap to keep the big strap from cutting their wind, the double snap attached to D on the cattle neck strap and to the neck yoke.

It was safe and worked well enough to get the job done, steering was compromised compared to a tight properly adjusted D-ring harness set up. I don’t know that we will eventually order heavy duty lazy straps, but forgetting jockey yokes and needing to improvise could be an argument to have them. I think for now we will return the spare set of jockey yokes to their place in the gooseneck of the trailer (everything was cleaned out recently for a beef show).

• This reply was modified 11 years ago by dominiquer60.
• This reply was modified 11 years ago by dominiquer60.

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[dominiquer60]

Moments like this is when it is handy to have a dairy herd to feed, it just has to wilt in order to put it in the silo 🙂

We are chomping at the bit for 3-4 good days in a row, the orchard grass is already something that they pass up in the pasture. Thank goodness for our recent hay field renovations with late timothy, it seems to make a big difference in quality.

• This reply was modified 11 years ago by dominiquer60.

[dominiquer60]

Greg Lange posted a similar hook on facebook, it had a swivel and more of an inverted triangle handle, he got his from Sampson Harness 6 years ago for $50.

page 32 http://www.samsonharness.com/publications/catalog-lo.pdf

• This reply was modified 11 years ago by dominiquer60.

[dominiquer60]

You may be able to get every thing you need from here or your local Temco parts dealer, there is one in Glen and Schaghticoke NY, there may be one closer to you. http://www.temcoparts.com/

[dominiquer60]

Before thinning/shortening I would take some shampoo to all their manes. Thin/shorten when they are dry, comb especially the curly hair out after a wash and before thinning, it will thin/shorten more evenly.

[dominiquer60]

I had shared this on our facebook page as well, I think that this is a great example of a well trained hitch of horses and human crew. The lack of panic from all involved was textbook perfect, and the announcer was fantastic at keeping the crowd from panic and pointed out the positive aspects of what was happening.

There are folks in our circle with this level of a relationship, but it is tough catching successful failures like this video. So I think it is a great one to share for how a wreck can be handled when animals have a good foundation of training, with the patience and trust to wait for their humans to get them out of a bad situation.

[dominiquer60]

Yes this is the Slack Hollow Cart, it has changed hands several times and now resides at Little Seed Farm in Chatham, NY. The hydraulics don’t work at the moment, so Willy just uses it as a forecart.

[dominiquer60]

The harrow or cultimulcher that you should use after ploughing depends on your soil and it’s moisture level. We have a sandy loam that can compact easy if wet.

I recently seeded an oat and pea cover crop. We plowed the 1/4 acre with our White Horse 715 plow and then made a single pass with our shipshe cultimulcher. This tool does a great job smoothing and leveling a well plow plot. We seeded the oats and peas and made a second but shallow pass with the cultimulcher to stir the seed and firm it in the ground. The seeding is coming up great on some good smooth looking ground.

We also plowed our potato patch with the 715, but the cultimulcher can pack the ground some and I want it loose for making potato furrows, so we used a disc harrow to work it up.

I also have a spring tooth harrow, chain harrow, cultipacker and tine weeder that I can use.

Here is a pass with the cultimulcher after plowing.

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[dominiquer60]

I used to be a professional groom, if you don’t like long or roached, there are 3 ways to shorten a mane WITHOUT scissors, scissors are bad. Nothing looks worse that blunt manes cut straight across with scissors.

1) You can pull it, there are plenty of vidoes on how to do this out there, but it can cause some discomfort.

2) Try an mane rake, http://www.chicksaddlery.com/page/CDS/PROD/2500/MTR95?utm_source=shopzilla&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=shopzilla%2Bdata%2Bfeed, these are great. The cleaner and more tangle free your mane the less the rake takes out at a time, if you use the mane rake on a dirty tangled mane you risk shredding the mane, in this case the outcome can be undesirable. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZ_80qq1nPE

3) You can use a blade, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hL7qUte9nVA, to shorten manes without making them look cut with scissors. I use the 84AU Oster clipper blade myself, it also does a great job at raking out the undercoat of dogs, http://www.osterpro.com/products/blades/078511-126-001.html#prefn1=ospAnimalType&start=18&sz=12&prefv1=large-animal.

Try a little of a method and see if you like it. Here are some before and after photos of one of my customers horses.

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[dominiquer60]

Here are a few photos.

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[dominiquer60]

No worries Sue, When I saw your plow where it was my first thought was that you must be straightening out a mess 🙂

[dominiquer60]

I am not sure that the SFJ forecart that I mentioned was used for precision cultivation. I will contact the new owner and see about getting some photos to share. If I recall, this cart was used for blind cultivation (lely tine weeder) disc, an maybe some crude 3pt cultivation, but it has been so long since my conversation with the original owner (this cart has changed hands at least 3 times that I have known it).

I will occasionally seed 2 rows 4″-6″ together in my 36″ row spacing. I will do this with salad greens, radishes and carrots when I feel that I don’t have the space for all that I want to direct seed, OR when I feel that my seeding rate or germination rate may not be ideal. I like the 36″ row system. I feel that it is less demanding on the soil, it requires less nutrients, less precision bed preparation and allows for easy cultivation using a single or two horse cultivator. The yield/acre is not as high as a multi-row per bed system, but for the reasons above and as stated in the Nordell’s “Weed the Soil” publication I feel the single row system works best for me. I came from the tractor cultivation camp and I honestly don’t miss a multi-row bed system. I feel that I can produce enough with the 36″ rows without pushing the soil amendments and bed preparation of a more intense enterprise.

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