First Cutting Alfalfa Pre-Bloom

On Monday the forecast was calling for rain so it looked like the alfalfa hay would have yet another week to grow but later in the day on Monday the forecast changed to two days of sun this week and cloudy until Friday when there was a chance of thunder storms. So I changed my plans and decided to cut half of my alfalfa. Here in our part of Iowa we can get at least 3 cuttings of alfalfa hay. Alfalfa is generally baled based on the bloom or flowers that you can see. Pre-bloom would be no flowers and then as the flowers appear you would go by percentage of bloom to estimate the time for harvest based on what you are trying to get from the alfalfa for nutrition vs fiber. The longer into bloom that you wait to harvest the less "nutrition" and the more fiber that is in the hay. So pre-bloom is genrally higher value but a lower yield, and into bloom and post bloom has more yield because the plant grows more stem and plant material but this offsets the nutrition in the leaves to do it. So dairy farmers like high nutrition and low fiber. Beef people like higher fiber and less nutrion. One would think that beef people would like the high nutrion, but it actually is too much for a beef can and can actually make them sick. When growing and harvesting the hay you have to harvest basted on your customers too. If you are selling to beef people you can harvest well into bloom because you get more yield and beef folks don't want all the nutrition anyway, but a dairyman will be very upset if his milk production goes down from feeding your hay. Milk is a direct result of the nutrition in the hay.

The first cutting of alfalfa usually has a larger stem and can be what is called stemmy, where there is a significant amount of stems to leaves. All of the nutrition is in the leaves so first cutting alfalfa is often considered of lower value. Since the alfalfa that I am cutting right now is a stand that has been around for quite a few years, it is already stemmy. To offset the stemmy nature of older alfalfa and of the first cutting I cut half of the hay pre-bloom. This should make the hay good for beef and horses, but not so stemmy that it gets woody. If you look at a bale that is first cutting post bloom you will have no doubt what the term woody means. It looks like you could use the hay to weave baskets.

So on Tuesday morning I cut the hay, yesterday morning I tedded (flipped it over and fluffed it up) and yesterday evening I raked it into windrows. So far so good. I'll check it for moisture once the coffee is done this morning. If the hay is 18 - 16% I'll bale. If it is higher then I'll wait for the moisture to drop. If it is less than 16% I'll wait until this evening for the dew to bring moisture back into the leaves to prevent them from shattering when I pick they hay up with the baler.