HE might only be 16-years-old but fourth-generation farmer Monty House is already reaping the rewards of his first hay crop.
The teenager cropped five small paddocks on his parents' 5774 arable hectare farm near Bruce Rock last season and has 1800 hay bales to show for it.
It was Monty's Friesian-Trakehner gelding 'Black Magic' that inspired him to plant 30 hectares of wheaten hay.
"I have a horse and the oaten hay we bought had gone to seed and it made the horse hot and hard to manage," Monty said.
"It didn't really agree with him and he was wasting a lot.
"There wasn't much Wheaton hay around so I thought, we have the land - maybe I'll grow it.
"It seemed liked the cheaper option and it was a good experiment for me."
Monty sourced 1978 Halberd seed from a neighbour and got to work sowing his crop, with the help of some old machinery.
"I used an old Massey Ferguson Sunshine 500 and an old Ford 4000 to put it in," he said.
"I borrowed a baler and a mower and we bought a rake.
"I was lucky because there was a lot of rain, so it was a good season for hay."
Monty's mother Sheena said the hay bales were of good quality and the family was happy with the results.
"The crop went about three times better than we expected," she said.
"One paddock had a few weeds, two paddocks were really good and we saved two paddocks for seed.
"We don't generally grow hay - we have in the past and we didn't get the moisture we needed, but this year was a wet year so it was great for Monty."
Monty finished harvesting his 10ha seed crop on December 29 and was pleased with its yield of around 2.2 tonne per hectare.
"I was happy with how it grew - it was very tall and had a nice head on it," he said.
"We pulled off about 11 tonnes to put in the silo for seed and delivered about 12 tonne into the bin."
Monty has kept some of his hay for use on the family farm and will sell the rest locally.
"I think we'll hold on to about 1000 bales for the horse and our cows and sell the remaining 800."
The teen is hoping to use part of the first crop profit to invest in a car.
Monty has also purchased a bale loader for future use.
Sheena said it was her son's passion for farming and hard work that made the crop such a success.
"He's been cropping since he was a kid - first with his toy tractors and machinery around the house and then he upgraded to the veggie garden.
"He was always inventing machines on the back of motorbikes and anything with wheels.
"He was very hands-on this year and did all his own scarifying and some discing, and then sowed the crop."
Sheena said Monty was very grateful for the support of his father Martin and several neighbours who gave him a helping hand.
"We had one neighbour sell Monty the seed for a really encouraging price, another neighbour lent us his mower and we borrowed a baler off Monty's riding instructor," she said.
"We also borrowed a little combine from another neighbour and our workman helped us a lot with carting the hay."
Monty will explore his passion for farming further this year, as he embarks on his year 11 studies at the Western Australian College of Agriculture in Cunderdin.
"I'm looking forward to going to Cunderdin - ever since I could talk I was saying I want to be a farmer," he said.
"I like the diversity of farming - you get to do different things everyday.
"You can be a mechanic, an electrician and an agronomist all at once - and you get to see the results of your hard work."
The teen is on track to follow in the footsteps of his father and hopes to one day run the family farm.
"I've always helped mum and dad on the farm and I was driving the header last harvest.
"Hopefully I can use the seed we harvested to put in another hay crop in 2017 and work on it over the weekends when I'm back from school visiting mum and dad."