Harvest

It has been three days since the start of the third cut and some of the grass has dried enough to be baled. It has been tedded, turned and raked into windrows and around midday ponies were out in the fields hard at work baling it. Some of those first bales went straight to market where they sold fast. The first yak buyers had arrived on the morning train and they were waiting in the bazaar. Yaks prefer "perfect" bales and they don't buy in advance, they pick and prod each bale before buying it. The best hay sold for three times the going rate for second cut hay, but there were plenty of takers for the hay that wasn't up to yak standards.

Applejack didn't take any hay to market today. Her strategy is to sell her hay in the early morning while the fields are drying and then she spends the rest of the day harvesting and baling with Big MacIntosh. She says that dealing with yak buyers is slow and tiring. They haggle over every bale but they pay well. What with the field expansions and the chaotic marketplace, Braeburn is coming to Ponyville to help sell the Apple Acres hay, which will give Big Mac and Applejack more time for their chores and to work the fields. A pony can't be in two places at once.