My first afternoon in Nashville, my friend and I went to Ann Patchett’s bookstore – Parnassus Books. It’s everything a bookstore should be. Tall ceilings, lots of wood, big windows, amazing children’s section, attentive staff and some wonderfully curated displays. There are two local authors tables, one of fiction on the fiction side of the store and one of non-fiction on the non-fiction side. Both displays had a wide variety of authors (not just a huge pile of one or two) and many of the books were signed.
I couldn’t resist. Although I didn’t recognize any of the titles, I managed to narrow it down to three; I asked the two staff at the desk for recommendations. Between them, they had only read one of the titles but they were familiar with the plots for all three. Based on their input I chose a historical fiction/fantasy (should that be called historical fantasy?) It’s set in Florence in 1473 and it intrigues me since I have actually been to Florence. I don’t know much at all about the history of Florence, so I’m looking forward to it.
I’ll let you know how it turns out.
Do you have any favorite local authors? (Yes, you should absolutely count our Chris!)
A friend of mine recently re-located here and just moved into her new townhouse; she invited me to come down for a few days to visit. Although I have been to this state, I’ve never been to this city before, despite having sent a few groups here over the years. I’m looking forward to a few relaxing days of sightseeing and entertainment.
The city is named after a Continental Army general during the American Revolutionary War.
The person who first called the U.S. flag “Old Glory” lived here.
The largest songwriter’s festival in the world is held here.
There is a full-scale replica of the Greek Parthenon in this city.
President Theodore Roosevelt coined the phrase “good to the last drop” here.
This was the first city in the nation to be granted an FM-broadcasting license.
The first seeing-eye dog training school in the U.S. was founded here.
Where am I? And if you know, what should I see while I’m here?
There was supposed to be a hard freeze Thursday night. Only got to 35°. We’re down in a valley so whatever the TV says the low will be, we’re going to be about 10° colder. It’s coming. Sooner or later. Minor cold spells, I unhook the hoses and put the pressure washer in the barn. Once it gets seriously cold, I’ll have to get more things picked up and put somewhere warm.
Driving to Plainview for parts last week showed a lot of farmers harvesting soybeans. Sounds like they might get to mine in the next few days. Good to hear. It was fun to see all the different combines. Some John Deere’s, some Case IH, even one Claas. You don’t see many of them in this area. I’m not even sure who the dealer is for Claas. That’s a big thing when buying equipment; who’s going to support it when needed. I really liked the Deutz tractor I bought back in 1986. But eventually it was hard to find mechanics or parts locally. There was a shop over in Wells MN that did good work on Deutz tractors, but 86 miles is a long ways to go for parts or service.
I’m bummed all the sweetcorn froze last week so that’s done for the season. What a shame; one cold night and that’s it. Glad we got some froze a month ago. It felt early when we did it, but this is why I guess.
We drove to Plainview so I could pick up some oil filters for the lawn mower and gator. My local dealer has most of my equipment in their records, but they didn’t have the gator for some reason, and I have a hard time remembering all the equipment model numbers. I knew it was an 835, but was it an “E”, “M” or “R”? And there’s a serial number break that uses different oil filters… shucks. I don’t remember. Eventually I found an email on my phone from the insurance company that had the VIN number so we got the right one. I wrote it down. In my phone where I have a file of oil changes on equipment.
All the tractors and machinery have model numbers. I know a lot of them but sometimes I forget. Is the soil finisher a 714 or 716? Wait, it’s a 724. The chisel plow is a 714. Or 716… Know there’s a 7 in there. Maybe this weekend I can get the oil and fuel filters changed in the truck too.
We quit filling the bird feeders this summer when the avian flu was going around. I filled them again this week, but so far nothing has come back.
Rosie and Guildy are still fine. The chickens seem to think those two have better food than they do. It’s all the same food, but it’s inside a pen so it must be better. One of those ‘grass is greener’ things. Right up until this happens.
See what happens when you do things you shouldn’t be doing? You get hung up and need to be rescued. She wasn’t there long. Kelly and I were out picking pears and then having a gator date when we spotted her. Once rescued she ran off to the pen and didn’t even appear too dizzy.
I haven’t seen anyone harvesting corn yet. The kernels are probably a little too wet yet and it’s early enough no one wants to pay for drying the corn yet if they don’t have too. Shelled corn (really, any crop) must be 15% or less moisture to store without spoiling. I’m guessing most corn is still upper 20’s. The ears are mostly still standing upright. The old timers used to wait until the ear had tipped down, then it was ready to harvest. I was just reading that corn on the stalk loses about .5% moisture / day. Course that depends on the weather. It dries a lot more at 70° than it does at 40° of course.
This is a good looking ear because of how it’s filled all the way to the tip. If the plant had any stress it would abort the kernels at the upper end. And there are some ears in the field that are not filled. But it’s neat to see this ear and know the crop had everything it needed to make good ears. Enough rain, the right nutrients, and no stresses. Think about how we could all do if we had no stresses and everything we needed to prosper?
The days are clearly getting shorter. It’s a little discouraging it’s already dark by 8PM. The barn swallows have moved on and the hummingbirds seem to be gone. Maybe the RedWing Blackbirds too. I do enjoy fall. I really like the change of seasons and fall and spring are my favorites. I enjoy the fieldwork and planting crops in the spring, and then fall and the harvest and doing that fieldwork and completing the cycle for another year. Not everyone in the house appreciates the earlier darkness and cooler temps. It’s all good.
Healthwise I’m improving. After feeling like I plateaued a few weeks ago, I can tell a difference again. Got the kidney stone removed a couple weeks ago. Got the stent they placed after that removed the other day (Lots of new experiences!) I can stand on one foot for a few seconds. Left knee will hurt until I get it replaced, but I’m walking better and driving and even climbed up on a box to reach something the other day. I even went to the car with both hands full one morning! AND I stepped over the dog in the kitchen! Getting there!
The sandhill cranes were out in the pasture this past Thursday. It was really nice to see them. Thanks to Steve for sending them our way…
Header photo is neighbor Dave’s cows. Kelly took a walk one night and was talking to them.
Chickens and big ducks are doing well. I went out to do chores and they came running.
We’re having a tough time with the ducklings. Down to two.
The one with the bad leg didn’t make it. And one day I let three out, and an hour later, one of them was dead. I don’t know. Fingers crossed for these two.
Crops are looking good. Corn stalks are starting to dry out and the kernels are dented. There’s still milk in the kernels, but it is coming along.
Multiply the rows around (16) and kernels in the length (36) = 576 kernels on this ear. Then we count the number of ears in 17.5’ (remember we counted the plants this spring. That’s 1/1000th of an acre) and it will vary, but roughly 30 ears per 17.5’, x 1000 = 30,000 x 576 = 17,280,000 kernels / acre divided by 80,000 kernels / bushel and that gives us 216 bushels / acre. Which is way too high for my farm on average. Factor in the deer damage, corn on the edges that the trees impact, ears that aren’t so good, hope for a late freeze, and well, we’ll see at harvest. But it does look like a decent crop this year.
We are thrilled the Sandhill cranes are back. We’ve spotted a pair and heard them flying over a few times and of course I can’t help but think of Steve. His book on sandhill cranes sits on the table and I reference it often. “The Cry of the Sandhill Crane”
I dug up the two oat fields just to keep the weeds down.
Some farmers use oats as a cover crop while another crop is being established; around here generally that’s alfalfa. Since I don’t need alfalfa, (because I don’t have cattle) I just grow straight oats. So I dig the field up a few times after harvest to keep the weeds down. It also adds organic matter to the soil, and I will leave something established before winter to help prevent erosion. Sometimes, after say, sweetcorn or canning crops, something that’s harvested fairly early so there’s plenty of time to grow something else, farmers will plant something to be a cover crop and then when plowed up you get the nitrogen boost from it. I’m sort of doing the same thing with the oat fields. Some of the oats will regrow and I’ll have a nice cover crop before winter.
There was one spot at the edge of a waterway where the giant ragweed was taller than the tractor! Yikes!
Wednesday I was back in the clinic and had a procedure to get that kidney stone removed that I’ve had since May. We called it Petra, Greek for stone. Had a Ureteroscopy. I heard a lot of pretty scary stories, and I’ve got a stent between the bladder and the kidney just to keep everything open. I go back in September to get that removed as an office visit. But really, I’m having no discomfort, I’m glad the stone is gone; one more thing to check off my list.
Soybean are really looking good.
They’re tall and have a lot of pods on them. Notice how low to the ground though the pods are.
At harvest, you have to run the head right down on the ground, not 6 inches up or you miss beans. And that’s why so many guys go over the field with the big rollers after planting, smoothing out and packing down rocks and everything and make a smooth surface so that at harvest, they can cut right down on the ground to get as many pods as possible. I don’t have the roller thingy, but I used a drag to smooth out the lumps.
I was quite amused yesterday on my way to work to see our insurance agent presumably driving to his office. He was riding a motorcycle. HE WASN’T WEARING A HELMET!
It seems to me that being an insurance agent means you exemplify caution and careful living. I remember the conversation we had together with our son when he got his driver’s license, and our agent told him to never hesitate to phone him any time, night or day, if he had been drinking and needed a ride home. Well, I wonder what he says to young motorcycle drivers he insures about helmets?
Our agent goes to our church and has a lovely tenor voice and sings with us in the choir. I can hardly wait to tease him about this.
What do you like to tease people about? What irony have you noticed this week? Any stories about insurance agents or companies?
They say July is corn month and August is Soybean month. Because July is the critical time in corn development, while it’s August for soybeans.
The corn has tasseled so it’s full height now, the silks are out, GDU’s, while down a bit this week with the cooler weather (which I love by the way) are 1714, 104 above normal.
I’m still mowing weeds, but I expect by the time you read this I will have finished. Or, if not exactly “finished”, given up and quit. The one area I’ve got left to mow is really rough and I will get tired of bouncing around in the cab.
All the crops are looking good, and while I was thinking I’d be cutting oats next Monday or Tuesday, looking at it Thursday shows a lot of green kernels yet so I may wait out next week yet.
The storms last Saturday knocked some oats down and in one field I saw some corn lodged on the edge of the field.
(“lodging” is basically stalk failure) Oats, As the plant is green and growing it has a lot of give. But as it matures, dries up, and turns golden, the stalk loses its flexibility, meaning it will break off in the wind. And it’s odd, how only certain parts of the fields will do that. Wind is very curious, as the songs from last week’s blog showed.
You can see from the pictures, only one part of the field went down, while the rest didn’t. And the green weeds still stand up. It’s all interesting.
We got nearly 2” of rain Saturday afternoon and then another .6” Saturday night. Kelly and I drove around in the gator checking on things after the afternoon storm. No trees down at least. And then we found a mama duck and 9 ducklings. Once again, Kelly is wrangling ducklings and I’m pointing and offering unsolicited advice.
Using a fishing net, she captured just about all the ducklings and I could get them in a box. But they’re tiny and a few escaped the net. She chased them down and we cleaned up a side pen for them. Now, just to catch mama. I remember one other year we did this; the mama could track the squeaking of the ducklings and we put up a ramp and eventually she got in there with them for a happy reunion. That wasn’t working this year and Kelly eventually captured her with the net too. Kelly and mama duck were in the pen and I was out in the gator. I heard some noises, and honking, and the doors wiggled a few times, and the mama got her head out the door once. But they’re all together now. We’ll keep them in here for a month or so. Until they’re big enough to survive outside… and we’ll see what happens.
A neighbor about ½ mile cross country from us said he saw two bear cubs playing on a log in his pond the other morning. Some neighbors have seen bears before, and we always assumed they were just passing through. But cubs… I don’t know, that seems like mama bear must be settled in here. Just what we need; another predator. I think it would be cool to see a bear. Long as it’s not eating the chickens. Do bears eat chickens??
CoCoRaHS – Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, And Snow network is an organization I heard about a few years ago. Cocorahs.org
Every day I report how much rain we’ve gotten. Some people report snow depth, and some people have full-fledged weather stations. I just report rain with some minor details like last Saturday’s amount in the afternoon and the evening. It is interesting to me to compare rain events in our area. There are about 14 reporting stations in the Rochester area, and three within a few miles of us. It’s interesting how the rain amounts can vary between us. I got a certificate for 250 reporting observations.
I’ve talked about the barn swallows outside our front door and the nest they’ve had for several years. Well, must be new residents this time around and they do not like us coming and going and they dive bomb us. Even at my car, 20’ from the nest they’re buzzing my head. We keep telling them “It’s us! You know us!”
ARE YOU A FALL RISK?ANY ISSUES WITH ANYTHING FALLING DOWN LATELY?
I feel like I’ve been busy lately. Nothing important, just… day to day living.
Crops are coming along. I talked with the co-op about spraying fungicide on the soybeans. I’ve never done it before, but I know some of the neighbors have and they report a good return. It will cost $33/acre to do it. $20 for the actual ground application and $13 for the chemical. Plus, some beans knocked down in the process. If beans are selling at $15 / bushel this fall, I will need the fungicide to increase yield by 2 or 3 bushels / acre to justify the cost. The neighbors have seen 10-15 bushel / acre increase over not treated so we’ll see how that goes. Curiously, aerial application is only $15/ acre! I’ve got too many trees, too many neighboring houses, and too small of fields to use that, but I was really surprised it’s cheaper. I supposed they can cover a greater area faster. It always comes back to efficiency doesn’t it?
My corn will be tasseling any day now. I’ve seen some of the neighbor’s corn already tasseling. Just depends on those GDU. (1559 to date. +110) Once the tassel is fully emerged, the plant is at full height. Silks will appear in a couple more days and then one or two weeks of pollination begins. There are so many critical things in any plant’s development but getting all that pollen from the tassels to the silks is a big one. The kernel won’t develop if the silk attached to it doesn’t get pollinated. Hard rains, hail, or storms can mess all that up.
And with the heat, some of the corn is curling up to protect it self. This is a rocky area, so the roots are shallow. Notice how the leaves have curled up?
And the oats is turning color, it just needs to keep standing, no wind storms, and hopefully this hot weather doesn’t boil all the milk out of the heads. It should be ready to cut in a couple weeks. Then get it harvested and the straw baled. I only planted 10 acres this year; less than half of normal because I was expecting the knee replacement this summer.
The straw delivery trip to the boonies of Winona last week was a great drive. 119 miles, took a few hours, saw lots of countryside with very little traffic, met a woman named Sunshine, had lunch in a bar in Witoka where my chicken sandwich was actually two chicken strips placed inside the bun. And there was enough lettuce on it to choke a horse and more fries than two of us could possibly eat. We even found the back way into Farmers Park: A minimum maintenance road that was pretty awesome and I’m glad we had the truck. It was washed out and rough with not one, but TWO single lane bridges.
I mentioned taking two hens to a friend. The next day I had a record 22 eggs! We wondered if the other chickens felt threatened and that they better step up production?? But no, couple days later there was only 8 eggs, then back to the usual 15 or 16. Production varies like that.
The little chicks are blending right in. Here’s some chicken photos including Rooster 3 minus a tail. Not sure what happen there.
That duck in the brush pile ran down to get something to eat one night and that was the opportunity we needed. The pile was burned. The duck was very put out for a couple hours. Sorry. It’s just the way it is.
My brother helped me get the brush mower hooked up and I’ve been mowing weeds in pastures and waterways. Of course I always have my tractor buddy with me. The corn is a tall as the tractor.
If it’s just grass, I’ll leave it standing, no reason to cut it. But there are a lot of thistles, wild parsnip, ragweed, stinging nettles, burdocks, and stuff that needs to be controlled. I’ll spend a few days yet mowing.
My nephew just retired after 25 years in the Air Force. He had the rank of Colonel and was a Base Commander in the St. Louis area. He had a big ceremony last week and some of the family went down. He’s a big nerd and they celebrated that by having several Star Wars characters there in costume. Unfortunately, Covid hit the gathering too.
Read an article about Ukraine; they are big producers of wheat and corn. But with the war, shipping has been an issue so their storage facilities (the ones that haven’t been damaged) are still full of last year’s crops and there’s no room to store this years crop. So they can sell it at a loss just to move it and get the storage facilities empty, but then they don’t have the income to support the families and communities either. Not to mention a shortage of food coming up. And as the war moved on from some of these areas, they needed ‘sappers’ to clear mines and other munitions from the fields, then they had to drag rockets and war detritus from their fields. Not something I have ever imagined doing, thankfully.
Padawan has been trimming weeds, and mowing grass, and he learned the basics on using a chainsaw.
EVER FELT PRESSURE TO STEP UP? WHAT ARE YOU SPIFFING UP LATELY?
The Botanical Garden, which opened to visitors here in 1859, is the oldest public garden in the US and among the top three public gardens in the world.
The first US kindergarten was started here in 1873 by Susan Blow. (You can still see her original class room!)
The Eads Bridge, completed here in 1874, was the first arched steel truss bridge in the world. The bridge continues to carry automobiles, pedestrians, cyclists and light rail trains!
Several new foods were popularized here in 1904: the hot dog, the ice cream cone and iced tea.
Famous folks from here: Maya Angelou, Yogi Berra, Daniel Boone, William Burroughs, Vincent Price, Stan Musial, Marlin Perkins.
As I’m counting down my last days at work, I’ve tackled a few projects that have to be put to bed before I’m gone.
One of these projects is, as I refer to it, “the old stuff”. At my company, we back up our systems every night but GETTING to that information, if you need it, is cumbersome at best and impossible at worst. You’d be surprised how often you might want to access information from an old program so about 25 years ago, we (or more accurately, I) started downloading our programs onto floppy disk. You remember those, right?
Then after a few years, as we were changing technology, as I did the annual download, I started downloading to diskette.
You know where this is going… we eventually moved to CDs. This annual download was accompanied by an updated spreadsheet of what programs were on which CD as well as name of client, location, date, etc. I was the keeper of the spreadsheet but we had paper copies sorted by either client or location, since those were the two most needed search criteria.
Fast forward through another technology change (which meant you had to use a portable CD reader to use the CDs), a fire in our building (which destroyed the paper files), pandemic (during which nobody was in the building to get to the CDs), data migration to a cloud based system during my furlough (which despite assurances to the contrary, caused the loss of about half my desktop files, including the spreadsheet).
Bottom line is that for the past 18 months, I’ve had two boxes full of unusable CDs under my desk. Nobody has asked about them since I got back from furlough. Even if they did, without the spreadsheet, finding any data would be nie on impossible. And nobody knows where the portable reader is anyway. Rather than asking any more about it, I just informed my boss last week that I was dumping them. Luckily we have CD/DVD recycling at my company AND I personally have a use for the plastic cases that many of them were stored in. Took me about an hour to separate the CDs from the cases and/or sleeves (header photo). Broke two fingernails. And all the while I was thinking about how the technology changed to the point where the data was lost to us.
And it’s changing fast; YA doesn’t even know what a floppy disk is!
What bit of technology would you not like to do without?
Trail Baboon 