NEWS for North Dakotans
Agriculture Communication, North Dakota State University
7 Morrill Hall, Fargo, ND 58105-5665

August 5, 1999

A Safe Harvest Starts With Good Swathing

Safe combining is heavily influenced by how a field is swathed. Keeping in mind the weight, maneuverability and limitations of a combine while swathing is a key to keeping harvest safe, says a North Dakota State University agricultural safety specialist.

"The direction and path of swathing in the field determines the travel of the combine," notes George Maher of the NDSU Extension Service. "Paying attention to combine hazards while swathing makes combining easier and safer."

He offers several swathing tips to improve combine safety.

• Swath to avoid sharp turns on hillsides. Combines with full or nearly full grain tanks can be unstable on hillsides. Starting and stopping combine movement on steep hillsides can also be difficult to do safely.
• Lay swaths far away from the edge of banks or drop-offs. Drills and swathers are much lighter than combines. The weight of a combine can cause the soil to shear off.
• Swath carefully around and across ditches and gullies. The combine's high center of gravity makes it much less stable than a swather.
• Make backward swaths around obstructions such as telephone poles. This reduces the chance of hitting a pole because the backward swath will cause the combine operator to drive around the pole with the grain auger on the outside of the turn. Such a procedure can also be useful in opening some fields for safer and more convenient combining.
• Lay swaths away from other obstructions in the field, especially at end rows and other areas where combines must turn. Due to rear steering, the back end of the combine swings wide as the machine goes through a turn. Meanwhile, the attention of the combine operator is usually focused towards the front of the machine.

With a better than average crop in some areas of the region this year, Maher urges machine operators to stay alert and think ahead. "Avoiding or anticipating potential problems is much safer than reacting to them at the last second," he says.

As an example he notes that operators may need to adjust the speed of swathers and combines more frequently to accommodate heavier crop stands. "Trying to swath with the same speed as in a light stand will result in more plugging and more stops, increasing the opportunity for an accident. Swathing at the proper speed, according to crop conditions and the lay of the land, is safer and will take less time than swathing with frequent stops for unplugging," Maher says.

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Source: George Maher (701) 231-8288
Editor: Tom Jirik (701) 231-9629