As I mentioned in a pervious video, I have two mowers that, just for fun, I wanted to use to do some cutting.

In this video we cut about five acres with two different sickle mowers, a John Deere Number 5 on a 1938 John Deere Model A, and a John Deere Number 38 mower on a 1951 John Deere Model A. Both the tractors and mowers are talked about in previous videos.

The crop is second-growth grain hay. The second growth is much less than the initial crop (it’s really only a one-cutting crop). The first cutting yields between 3.5-4 ton an acre, so it makes a really good rotational crop where I rotate fields out with alfalfa.

Shortly after starting, the 38 lost a section. Where it’s such a small amount to cut and we didn’t have a lot of time, we didn’t replace it. The mowers did an okay job, but compared to our more modern rotary swather/windrowers, the sickle mowers definitely don’t leave as clean of a cut as our more modern machines. The field was also sprayed not too long ago, so where the tractor knocked down the crop made it so they didn’t cut as well either.

All of those problems aside, using the old mowers and tractors was a lot of fun. It was pretty cool hearing the two old “Johnny Poppers” going, and I’m sure it turned a few eyes and ears as people drove by or could hear it going throughout the town.

Needless to say, I won’t be parking the big modern 16′ cut rotary windrower any time soon–but taking a little time every now and then to just enjoy the old equipment is an enjoyable thing to do too! 🙂