Farmer to Farmer 'Bale Out' a Project of the Heart

Gay Brownlee
Virginia Correspondent

LURAY, Va. — Jerry Turner watched with satisfaction as two semi-trailers driven by commercial driving students and accompanied by their instructors, rolled onto Countryside Farm to load 40 of some 100 round bales of hay he is donating to fellow farmers in Augusta County, on Wednesday, Sept. 17.

The snowy white and fire engine red rigs had traveled some 60 miles from the Blue Ridge Community College Commercial Driving School, for the purpose of participating with farmers in a hay donation project. Their role was providing free gratis transportation from Point A to Point B -- a stockpile location in Verona for scheduled pick-ups.

The idea of sharing the hay bounty hit Turner one day when he realized how much hay he and his neighbors were making while a severe drought was yielding very little hay to Augusta farmers.

“This year has probably been one of the best years we’ve had,” Turner said.
With 1,800 round bales made already and third cutting underway, Turner said
“God has been very good to me this growing season and we need to share and pass it around.”

Turner contacted Extension agents Bill Whittle, Page, and Jason Carter in Augusta, and shared his notion with the Page County Farmers Association.
Everybody was supportive but there would be challenges.

"It’s one thing to donate hay,” Whittle said, “and another to transport it.”

They pondered the questions of how much, what type, what quality and who would receive it?

In Augusta, Carter developed an application form his people could fill out. A fairness formula was developed for distribution amongst the applicants.

Carter was pleased with the hay quality on Labor Day when he and Turner visited farms.

“The hay is terrific,” Carter said. “A lot is net wrapped first and second cutting.”

Carter also approached BRCC with regard to moving the units.

“Augusta lets us use some of their parking area for practicing,” said Mike Eller of the BRCC staff and coordinator for the commercial driving school. “Anytime we can do some community service to them we are glad to do that.”

Eller said that hauling hay would allow the students to experience the weight differential between other loads they usually haul.

The route to Countryside Farm covered back roads and narrow roads but also navigating hairpin curves and mountainous terrain between the towns of Luray and New Market.

“First thing,” warned instructor Donald Vess, “Make sure you are in the proper gear at the top so you are not going to shift gears on the way down. You always go down in the same gear you pulled it in,” Vess said. “It takes as much force to pull the vehicle up the hill as it takes hold-back down the hill.”

Hay is different according to Vess. “We need to tie on more and we need to show the students how to make sure the load is not going to move on the highway.”

“It’s been a unique experience for me personally,” Carter said, recalling his youth in Appomattox County during a severe drought in 1985.

Carter said he remembered the hay donations arrived on railroad boxcars from donors in Ohio and Pennsylvania. The difference in this case, he said, is the farmers are almost neighbors and that it is very encouraging.

“It’s a very generous and a unique event,” said Carter.

“He is very thoughtful about sharing his bounty,” Whittle said about Turner.