Skid Steer Bale Spear and Hay Handling Attachments

Skid Steer Attachment for Moving Bales: Grapple Squeezer vs. Hay Spear

Most hay spear attachments work by impaling the bale on one or more tines. They are simple and need no hydraulics, but the tine has to penetrate, which puts holes in net wrap and plastic film and makes handling wrapped baleage awkward. A grapple squeezer instead clamps the bale between two hydraulic arms. Nothing is punctured, wrapped bales stay sealed, and the same arms will hold loose hay, brush, or an odd-shaped load that a spear cannot pick up at all. This collection carries the squeezer style only, in a single size.

What Is in This Collection

One attachment, the Loflin Fabrication Hay/Bale Grapple Squeezer Attachment, listed at $320.

Matching a Bale Attachment to Your Machine

Three things decide fit: coupler, hydraulics and capacity. This unit uses a reinforced universal skid steer quick attach, the common plate on full-size skid steers and most compact track loaders; mini and stand-on machines that use a smaller proprietary plate will not take it without an adapter. Because the arms are cylinder-operated, the loader needs a working auxiliary hydraulic circuit at the front of the arms, with couplers that match the supplied Parker fittings. Capacity is the part buyers skip. A bale rides well out in front of the coupler, so the number that matters is your machine's rated operating capacity, which SAE J818 defines as half the static tipping load for skid steer loaders, not what the machine can break off the ground. Weigh a representative bale instead of estimating; moisture changes bale weight far more than diameter does.

Service and Common Mistakes

Grease the oversized pins on a set schedule, since bale work is dusty and dry pins wear fast. Route and clamp the hoses so they cannot rub the loader arms through a full lift cycle, and cap the couplers when the attachment is parked. The frequent misuse is treating a squeezer as a pushing or prying tool for stacks, feed piles and frozen ground — side loads bend arms and tube steel that clamping never would. Carry bales low and tilted back, and keep travel speed down on uneven ground.