By SHELLY STRAUTZ-SPRINGBORN
Michigan Correspondent

LANSING, Mich. — A break in the weather has finally given farmers enough warm and dry conditions to harvest hay.

According to the agricultural summary from the Michigan Field Office of the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service for the week ending June 27, only 69 percent of Michigan’s first-cutting hay crop had been harvested, down 12 percent from the five-year average and 5 percent behind last year.

Farmers reported that about half of the state’s harvested hay was in good or excellent condition, while the other half was in fair to poor condition.

Charles Mulholland, of Coral, and Ken Venema, of Sheridan, both said wet weather kept them out of the fields during the month of June.

“I did nothing after Memorial Day weekend until this week,” said Mulholland, who has about 160 acres of hay this year. “There may have been one or two windows of good weather that I could have, but the weather report didn’t sound like I could have gotten it up without a shower on it.”

“This has been a terrible year to try to put up hay,” Venema said. “There’s a lot of junk hay out there. But the hay I got up, I got up with no rain on it.

“I’ve been doing hay for 40 years and this is one of the worst years I’ve had,” Venema said. “I can’t think of any other years that were this wet in June for this long – it went all the way through June. I just held off. I’d rather put it up a little over-ripe than black.”
Mulholland said the quality of this year’s crop is better than he expected.

“There’s a lot of soft grass in it. I have one field that may be over mature. I need good quality dry hay for horses,” he said. “I’ve got some marvelous second cutting. Sometime right after the 4th of July, if the weather cooperates, I’ll clip it.”

Both farmers said they have some hay left from last year, but they aren’t worried about being able to sell it. Driving around his neighborhood, Mulholland said there’s a field of hay with freshly-cut second cutting lying in rows next to black first cutting that was never baled.

“There has just been a lot of spoiled hay around so far this year,” Mulholland said. “There may be a good market for good hay in the coming year. Every year is different. You never know when there may be a shortage of hay.”

Venema agreed.

“I think the market is going to be full of a lot of junk hay this year,” Venema explained.

“There probably won’t be much third cutting because everybody is getting their first and second cutting off so late. If you have good hay, there’s going to be someone interested in buying it.”
Elsewhere in Michigan, farmers were continuing to get caught up with first-cutting harvest.

In his weekly Michigan State University (MSU) Extension Crop Advisory Team (CAT) Alert, Bruce MacKellar, agriculture educator in southern Michigan’s Van Buren County, reported that until this week, farmers had been struggling to find harvest windows.
“First cutting is way over mature, and producers are cutting just to get it off of the fields,” he wrote.

“Second cutting looked good, but with some concerns.”
MacKellar cautioned farmers to watch regrowth for leafhoppers and be ready to treat fields accordingly.

In Gratiot County, MSU Extension Educator Dan Rossman reported that some first cutting is being completed, second cutting alfalfa harvest “is in full swing,” and yields “have been very good.”