Here in the lowlands in and around Vienna the grain harvest earns only that - grain. It is different in many highlands regions where there is also cattle breeding, and where the straw is carefully stored in barns because it is needed as litter.
Not so hereabouts. The straw is bundled to bales - and left right there, on the fields, as you can see. The lowland farmers certainly try to sell their straw, but there is too much of it and they don't have livestock themselves (or if then only a few horses for the fun of riding, and that's it). Sometimes these bales lie there out on the fields a whole year, when the straw of course is already ruined; sometimes these bale stacks even catch fire (they heat by themselves if they get warm and wet). So it is a real waste. But of course you can't give the bales away for free, now can you?
