Big round or small square?

There are several reasons little idiot cubes sell better, Horse people do not like round bales, they can and do mold. Small squares need to be stored inside and therefore dry. It is easier to tell quality in small bales. Break one and see. Big rounds are hard to feed to individual stalled horses. Many people do not have a tractor.

Using a big round baler, it takes a lot of hay, some times more than 1 round around a field, thus mixing good and poor quality hay.

I have baled 1000s of ton of hay a year, all with small squares. Small squares can be rebaled and exported, getting more tons in a container. No rounds are exported. We used an accumulator behind the baler and a loader with a squeeze to move and load, both on tractor loaders and road machines. Put in the shed, reloaded and hauled to the proccesors, rebaled and put in containers. A lot more options than rounds....James

Go small square. If you aren't going to go to a bigger tractor than a 3x4 round baler, go with the money of small squares.

10 acres, 2 cuttings a year, shouldn't even make 3 people sweat.

Well, much.

Paul

gonna say I would probably sweat
I put up about 300 bales of small squares a year for my wife's hay burners, sick cows etc. The bulk is in big round for ease of handling.

As to selling the hay what do the prospective buyers buy in your area that is what you bale to.

Lots of folks have stated small squares must be stored inside. Well, that depends where you are as well. We just stack them off the hayliner, and cover them with a hay tarp. They store well this way. But we are also cooler up here.

They make some enormous tarps that are the fraction of the cost of a hay shed. Especially for just 10 acres.

Ok for me putting up Hay anymore Round Bales is the way to go, less Labor. When I was feeding Goats and couple calves I preferred Small Square Bales.

big rockpile

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Buyers of round bales are IMO more aware of what they get for the money spent. Large consumers want to buy by the ton and they may ask for the contents of the bales to be sampled for quality.
Small square bale buyers are hobby users and small scale buyers. These buyers are not as concerned with value for their money as they are for perceived quality of hay. The small square bales will generate more income from a specific tonnage grown.
The best hay that I have seen is from commercial growers using the large square balers. Their hay is cured properly and the large square bales are tightly compressed reducing storage space and transport without incident. These large squares will flake off for minimal waste and ease of handling.

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Agmantoo
If they can do it,
you know you can!

Square bails sell better but ether take a lot more labor or more expensive equipment. Round bails will make less money but take less input (labor/equipment)

Small squares work for us. I can sell them to neighbors that are raising a cow or couple of horses. The local sales barn will buy them as well.
We are down to about 6 acres we cut twice a year. I cut half at a time so we only need a couple of wagons.

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Deja Moo; The feeling I've heard this bull before.

That's similar to what I do. My hay guy lives about a mile up the road from me. He brings me a wagonload and I tarp it over. As long as I keep a close eye on the condition of the tarps, it works out just fine!

Last year, I had some pinhole leaks in a tarp, and lost about 20 bales, but that's still cheaper than building a hay barn.

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Small squares are going to be by far your cheapest option to make, you can get a decent square baler for 2500 where a round baler you would be much higher. The costs of everything else is going to get you haybine (you have to get one with conditioners in Wisconsin) around 3500. Rake. 1000. Wagons 2 or 3 1000 each. Do you need an elevator to get them into the barn? Have you ever baled hay before? There is a learning curve to it, both on the making it side (small squares are a lot less forgiving then rounds) and on keeping your equipment going. What part of wi are you in?

Besides helping a guy when I was in high school once, I've never done hay. I don't have a traditional barn, just a pole barn, so no haymow. I won't need an elevator, just a way to keep the bottom bales out of the dirt (right?). There are plenty of small square balers around - sometimes people even have ones for around $1000 they are currently using and will demo them. I'm in NW Wisconsin - about an hour NW of Eau Claire/25 minutes north of Menomonie.

Is this grass hay, or alfalfa, or a mix of grass and clover with old alfalfa in too?

What do you plan to bale long term?

Cutting the hay, and conditioning it if alfalfa, is the biggest expense.

Grass hay you can do with a $500 sickle mower. But anything stemmy, and you do better conditioning it. Even grass you may want to condition. Then you are looking at a complicated machine, you need to spend good money on for a smooth running one.

Paul

We don't have a 2 story barn either. In one shed I can get away with just a layer of old plywood in another I use a layer of pallets. Last year we put down a layer of plastic on top of the pallets because sometimes we get some mold on the bottoms.
Will see how they do this spring.
We do have an elevator or 2 around, throwing hay up on big piles can be a pain. Did a lot of that as a kid. We would fill the barn and stack stuff out in our pole shed, having a twine break as you swing a bale up to a 12 high pile from the top of a 6 high load can be an experience...

We condition everything even grass here in central WI. Have done it that say since 1969 and don't know of anyone who doesn't.
We run a 7' mower/conditioner, let it lay a couple of days and roll it over the morning of the day we want to bale.
I do have an old crimper that I can run over the hay if I want to fluff it up or ted it.
It is different from other crimpers in that it has a pick-up head on it and actually fluffs the stuff up.

Bought my baler for 700 bucks from a guy who had been out of farming for a couple of years. It was shed kept and in very good condition had it hooked up to a tractor and running when I went to look at it. Just gotta keep your eyes open...

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Deja Moo; The feeling I've heard this bull before.

Right now it's not hay at all. It's leased to a guy who does a corn/bean rotation. If/when i do it, it would be grassy hay as I am planning on having beef. It may even be pasture some of the time.