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sell and use in the house. I often had cream on my porridge, it was ”yum”. The leftover skim milk was fed to the neighbour’s pigs.
Making Hay
Making hay was a regular summer job. It was quite different to what it is today, firstly we used a horse instead of a tractor and secondly the hay wasn’t made into bales or rolls and the machines used were more primitive.
First we would close off a paddock and let the grass grow till it was about ½ a metre high then we would harness up the horse onto the mower and cut the grass. The mower was not like a lawn mower, the driver sat on it and it had a long blade out of the side which cut the grass and laid it neatly on the ground.
After 2 days when the cut grass had started to dry the horse was harnessed up again but this time onto the Buck Rake to rake the grass into long rows called ”Windrows” for another 2 days of drying. The Buck Rake was about 3 metres wide with 2 big wheels on either side and a seat in the middle for the driver, it had big tines between the wheels to rake the hay and they were able to be lifted up when enough hay to make a ”Windrow” had been collected. You can see examples of mowers and buck rakes in Farm Museums. Granddad got the job of mowing and raking when he was about 9 or 10 years old.
After another 2 days or when the hay was properly dry it was placed into piles called ”Cocks”. The hay was placed so if it rained the water would run off and the hay inside wouldn’t get wet, just like the thatch on old houses protects their insides. The hay could now be left until we had time to stack it.
The hay was brought in to the barn or haystack either with a horse and dray or on the back of a truck the ”cocks” being picked up with a pitchfork and packed on the dray or truck till it was piled high. My Brother and I used to like to ride on the top of the hay, it was fun.
To make a Haystack the ”cocks were taken off the dray/truck and piled on a layer of sticks, (to keep the bottom hay dry), then built up to make a big oblong block about 3 metres high with a rounded top. The last thing to do was to thatch the stack, to make it weatherproof, this was done by getting a pitchfork and scratching the top and sides so the strands of hay pointed downwards.
In the winter when the hay was to be fed to the cows the stack would have lost 1/3rd. of its height and the hay would be packed down hard. We would have to get a big long hay
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