Category Archives: Farming Update

animals, Farming Update, Health, Uncategorized

End of October

111 Comments

We got 0.4” rain Thursday night. Made a puddle where I throw out corn and the ducks appreciate having their drinking water 5 steps from the food.

It’s gonna get cold next week. I better take the outside faucet out of the wellhouse and move the pressure washer someplace heated. I supply straw to a neighborhood strawberry farm to cover their berries in the winter. They took 150 bales right off a wagon this summer and now they’re ready to cover the berries and will need another “15-50” bales. And another person near them wants 15 bales so I will take 60 over on a trailer tomorrow.

I saw Lowes the other day, selling regular size small bales of straw (not the mini- decoration bales) for $13 / bale. Wowzer! I need to raise my prices.

I haven’t had time to do any farming the last few weeks. The neighbors are all crazy busy combining corn and doing fieldwork and doing all that stuff they need to do. I’ve got a show to open (Will be open when you read this) plus the finishing touches on the theater remodeling project (Open house on the 6th) and a Lab quiz Monday in Geology class (identifying rocks and minerals) so studying for that plus regular class homework. So, I don’t have time to farm anyway for a couple weeks yet… what I have to do when I get time is get the new gear box put on the brush mower and finish working on the grain drill and other things on my home “To do” list.

Duck update – Missing the old, balding, poofy one… down to 6 poofs. And it’s hard to say if the old one died or got snatched. The five black and white ones are still there, the 4 cream colored ones are still there, and I have a hard time getting a good count on the brown ones; 20 or 21 but they’re still there.

We have 3 guinea fowl on the farm. They’re terrible mothers; lay a nest of 20 eggs and get up and walk away after the first 6 or 8 hatch. Usually a cold rainy day in October. Last week one day, first cold night with freezing temps, there she is with 6 babies.

The three seem to be cooperative parenting. And the 6 babies have made it a week now.  But don’t hold your breath.  We could catch them and move them inside… but that takes a while and it’s more chores and I just can’t take it on right now. We had been taking about getting more guineas next summer anyway.

I was at the doctor this week; nothing serious, just ‘old man skin’ and had a couple spots frozen off. Lost my only wisdom spot… guess I wasn’t using it enough.

I mentioned the other day I’ve had music of ‘Pink Floyd in my head all week. Still there. I’ve been listening to a lot of that. Loud. It’s better that way.

Here’s some of the neighbor’s cows at our place.

Did you ever think you were going to get old? How does it compare to what you imagined as a kid?

2021, animals, Farming Update, Weather

A Frosty Morning

103 Comments

Today’s post comes from Ben.

Guess the heating degree days are over… This is kinda late for the first real frost or freeze. I had to break some ice out of the chickens water buckets this morning. These first few temporary cold mornings I don’t get too concerned about. I unhooked some hoses and pulled the pressure washer into the garage and wrapped a towel around the pump. But I haven’t turned on the house heat yet. How come it’s frequently a full moon when we get the coldest temperatures? I think there’s an Indian summer coming yet. Or did we already have that?

First things first: Duck update. It makes me smile when I walk outside in the morning and call “Come on Ducks. Chickens! Chickens! Ducks!” and they all quack and waddle over to the barn for their morning corn.  The dogs are running around and having fun and that interrupts the duck’s processional and they backtrack once or twice before the dogs get in the feed room to catch sparrows and the ducks can finally get up to the corn. I spread out two buckets of corn: one in the grass and one on the gravel. Ducks need water while they eat you know. They eat a bunch, go get a drink, then back to eat more. Chickens don’t gobble so much up at once…they just peck at it. Ducks gobble. I am down two of the poofy headed ones… used to be 8 new ones and the older, balding poofy headed duck. Now there’s only 7 including the older poof. Coyotes I suspect. The white ones are easier to spot in the dark I guess.

Soybeans are out! Yay! Started last Saturday afternoon about 3:00 on my rented ground. I stopped in about 5:00 and they were done over there and had moved to our home farm. Moving fields is a pretty big deal. There’s the combine, the head on the cart, the semi, and the tractor and grain cart. Plus, whatever pick-up is left at whichever field as they move stuff.

Grain carts have become invaluable these days. As with most things, it was in the interest of production and time that these came in. The cart can run in the field and the combine can unload while it’s still harvesting. Then the cart can run back to the truck and unload. That keeps the truck on the road – or at least out of a muddy field where it would get stuck. The carts keep getting bigger, just like everything. It all keeps getting bigger.

My soybeans did OK for quality. They were dry enough and test weight (the weight of a bushel) was good. Yield wasn’t the best, only averaging about 37 bushels / acre. I was hoping 40’s. Last year I got 51 bu / acre. But this rented field really doesn’t grow good soybeans and it really pulls my average down. I’m having that field ‘Grid Sampled’ for soil testing, meaning the Co-op will pull a handful of samples every 2 acres rather than just 1 or 2 samples on the 10-acre field. I’m guessing it will need lime applied to get the soil pH in line. And since they apply lime with an air spreader, they can adjust the rate as needed which, theoretically, will pay for the cost of grid sampling. Remember I planted these beans in 20” rows just for fun? Hard to say if that made a difference or not. If I take out the lousy production of the rented field my average goes up into the 40’s. And with the dry hot weather this year, I’m grateful we got any crop.

Price for the soybeans was good; $11.71 / bushel was my price. Course two days later it was $11.83 at the local elevator. Hauling it to the river gets a better price, but also costs more for hauling. And this late in the soybean season, the river doesn’t always have room for them. And since this was a Sunday, I’m not sure the river elevator even would have taken it. And since I’m not driving the truck, it’s kinda the neighbors call whether they have time to run them to the river.

So 37 bushels (one acre) x $11.71 = $433 / acre gross. Seed cost $55/acre, fertilizer $45/acre, spraying pre-emergence grass and post emerge broadleaves is $75/acre,  combining is $39/acre, grain cart $5/acre, hauling is 0.13/bushel, plus some rent on the one field (I won’t mention the rent cost; that can be pretty competitive in some markets. It might be $200 – $350/acre) I’m lucky I only pay rent on the one field. Diesel fuel, tractor use, my time added in (somewhat variable)… we’re somewhere north of $250/acre for expenses not counting rent. Net, then, is $183/ acre. Losing money on the rented ground.  So you can see why we want the best production we can get and I get so grumpy about how much crops the deer and turkeys are eating. Remember, this is just my farm. Your mileage may vary.

I’m guesstimating corn yields and production as I estimate paying off year end bills. Corn is a little more expensive to grow but yields more / acre too. And this year, with the poor stand, it’s anyone’s guess what production will be. Costs for next years crops is way up over this year. Fertilizer and chemicals have practically doubled.

There’s a lot of corn standing yet in the neighborhood. I can hear a neighbor’s corn dryer fans running when I stand outside at night. Sounds of the season. In a few more weeks it will be surprisingly quiet some night. Just another reminder of the cycle of the seasons.

Photos:

  1. Notice the broken kernels. That’s considered ‘Foreign material’ and we get docked for that. Soybeans are kinda delicate. They don’t like rough handling or they crack.
  • The neighbors like their equipment red. Long as it gets the job done. Here’s the combine, Humphrey, and the bean head on the cart. (The head is 35’ wide; they take it off to travel on the highway).  
  • The grain cart in this picture is holding 805 bushels.  At 57 lbs / bushel that’s 45,885 lbs.  That’s why they don’t often drive into the field with a loaded truck.  

Does this all make sense? Any questions? What’s the biggest thing you’ve ever driven? Or ridden in? Anyone been in a blimp?

2021, Farming Update, Kids, Uncategorized

Fall Has Fallen

99 Comments

Today’s post comes from Ben

Rainy and cool today… talking lows in the upper 30’s this week… might get a frost yet. Or a freeze in the valley’s.

Ducks are good.

As of Wednesday, I’m still waiting to get my soybeans out. There’re not too many soybeans out in the fields yet. People are surprised when I tell them mine aren’t done. The neighbors who will harvest mine are working in the neighborhood; they’ve got a field right across from one of my fields so with the nice weather predicted for this week I would expect by the time you read this, soybeans might be done. Fingers crossed and the creek don’t rise. It’s out of my control; they’ll get them when they get them.

Things are busy in my real job world and I’m almost stressing out over them. Got the college show to open on the 28th. Got an open house for the remodeling at another theater scheduled for the 6th of November and I need to get those bathroom stalls installed. Plus class. Plus “life”. It’s enough to push a man to drink.

Doing a local field trip come Monday in geology class. It’s hard to do field trips during Covid. Everyone drives themselves… Trying to fit 3 or 4 stops into 2 hours. I predict it will be like herding cats, but we’ll see. Just a 1/4 mile up the road from campus is an exposed hillside of St. Peter Sandstone. And a little bit further is some other rocks and then there’s a spot I specifically keep asking the teacher about because of the layers and colors in this exposed hillside. Isn’t it amazing to realize these rocks are a BILLION years old and that the layer of darker rock on the top was put there 60 MILLION YEARS AGO?? MAN!! That just blows me away. I know just enough from class now to be dangerous. I’m just beginning to understand that rocks can change and become other rocks. Pressure or erosion and now it’s a different rock. Huh! I just thought they were rocks. I’m far to old to remember all the terms, but it’s interesting.

Last week and we talked about finding things and that reminded me of some other stuff we’ve found in the woods or in the fields.

November 1st one year, I was going in to do some plowing and down one of the field roads was a car. Tires were gone, stereo ripped out, one of those “key Keeper” things the car dealers used to have on the rear window was in the back seat. I called the deputies. Seems like if you find a car before it’s reported stolen, they don’t know what to do with it. They contacted the owner. He had consigned it to a dealership to sell and it had been stolen off the lot. But it was still his problem at this point. So now it was considered ‘abandoned’ and the owner had to hire a tow truck to come and pick it up.

One time a friend was leaving and a few minutes later was back to say there was a car tipped over in the woods but there was no one around. I drove up there to see it and it appeared from the tire tracks they had been fishtailing up the road, lost control, hit a bank and tipped the car over. There was just a little bit of blood on the door frame from pulling themselves out, but no one around. This was way before airbags or cell phones. I waited, Kelly went back and called deputies. I saw a car come in, see me, and back away again. I don’t recall what all became of that. There’s been several situations of me chasing people out of the fields. Twenty years ago, before we put the gates on the end of our driveway, it was worse. With the gates, they didn’t have a place to hide and trouble moved on.

Just yesterday I noticed someone over at a rented field, vehicle tracks off the road, made a loop through the soybean field, and back on to the road. Sigh. Could be worse; could have made a lot more tracks through the field. This will only amount to a few bushels. Dad always told the story of kids driving through the hayfield. Except they lost the license plate in the field. Deputies were able to track them down. Somehow dad arranged that their punishment was for them to come out one Saturday morning and help clean calf barns using a pitch fork. He said they were good kids, and they were just screwing around. But stay out of the fields next time.

We got to know some of the sheriff deputies pretty well. One night Kelly saw several cars come down in the yard, turn around and go back out. Well, that pretty much means ‘Party’ so she called deputies. I was coming home and from the highway I was seeing this line of car headlights coming out of our driveway. What the heck?? Eventually I could get in and there were 3 deputies. There was a party down a field road, out of sight, and the kids had just tapped the keg when the deputies showed up. Officer Kirby was pretty excited about breaking up the party. Of course, the kids took off running and the officers told them, ‘We got your cars, you may as well come back.’ I think everyone got a warning that night. And I found plastic cups all over the corn field that fall.

TALK ABOUT BEING PUNISHED. As a kid, As an employee? Or punishment given as a parent or employer.

Farming Update, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Nice October Weather

122 Comments

Today’s post comes from Ben.

Sure has been a beautiful fall so far.

GDU’s, Growing Degree Unit’s are 529 above average for the Rochester area. Average is 2702 GDU to date giving us 3231 this year. In 2020 we had 2914 GDU and 2019 was 2800 GDU’s to date.

A little unusual we haven’t had that killing frost yet. Lilacs are blooming again. Weird.

Neighborhood reports are that soybean stems are still green and making it hard to combine, but the beans themselves are almost too dry at 9% or 11% which leads to them shelling out of the pods too easily and that means ‘header loss’, meaning they pop out before they even go into the head of the combine. Can’t cash them in if they’re on the ground. A lot of time is spent adjusting the combine settings to capture as much of the crop, as cleanly as possible. (Mind you, I only partially know what I’m talking about here; I don’t have a combine) The rotor and separator are where the crop is separated from the cob or pod. It’s adjustable of course; bigger for corn, smaller for oats or beans. Large fans blow the chaff and debris out the back of the combine. It’s *quite* the deal. There are all sorts of YouTube videos out there. Google it if you’re interested. Most guys are done with beans and working on corn. Corn has reached ‘physical maturity’ or ‘black layer’. Meaning all the milk has dried out in the kernel and there’s actually a black line that moves down the kernel and now there’s a black spot down at the tip. That doesn’t mean it’s dry enough to store without drying, just that it’s done growing. Again, no freeze and this warm weather is helping it dry further. All good things. My beans are still out there. They’ll get to them when they get to them.

I don’t see many fields between our house and the college unless I take the long way around. A trip to Plainview for parts gives me a chance to see what the neighbors are doing. And that works all year round.

A while ago I removed that broken gearbox off the brush mower and took it to John Deere. I was up there for other parts last week and the shop foreman showed me a bad spot in the gear box meaning it wasn’t worth repairing and I should probably order a new one. Sigh. I had ordered the shaft already for $750. Labor on replacing it was going to be at least that same amount. And now I’ve got a 10 yr old rebuilt gearbox. So, for another $800 I could get a new one. It’s only money… I ordered a new one. Haven’t gotten it yet… any day now.

I spent some time working on the grain drill one day. Got several things put back together and a few more things apart. “One day” I hope to have time to work on it again.

The ducks are expanding their area and this morning were up around the house. They are getting calmer when I throw corn out to them. They don’t panic and run away so much; they’re figuring out I provide food I guess. There’s a hose that I leave out to fill buckets and a large puddle for the ducks. Over near the water hydrant, the hose has a pin hole in it, and I get a little cold water shower as I take corn out. Some mornings that thrill is a little more exciting than other days. I could walk around it, I could patch it, I could just turn the hose over… but sometimes that little thrill is a good way to start the day, you know?

The last two weeks I have been busy with theater. I’ve lit ‘Evil Dead – the Musical’. It’s a total spoof on the horror movie genre. “Five College kids at an abandoned cabin for the weekend. What could go wrong?” It’s pretty fun. I don’t like horror movies and I’ve never seen this one. But the spoof is fun. And it’s a musical! Between that and the remodeling at another theater, it’s taking up my time. Plus, construction at the college for our show here. “Women” by Chiara Atik– a spoof on ‘Little Women’. Keeping me busy.

Kelly and I had a ditch date the other day. That’s what we call it when she helps me pick up garbage from the township ditches. Took the dogs along too. This was a couch and at least it wasn’t a sleeper. I stopped at the townhall to pick up some stuff in the building to take to the recycling center and there was one of those 55 gallon cardboard barrels we wanted to get rid off. Empty other than some newspapers from 1977. It seemed too good to throw out so I left it on the side of the road by the townhall. You people in town have it so easy with the boulevard exchange thing. This morning the barrel was still there. I think I need to put a $5 sign on it. Or maybe people are afraid to see if there might be something inside it.

I’ve gotten some good stuff off the boulevard. Or out of the ditch. Like my winter ‘ditch jacket’ and an air compressor, and a large wicker chair down in the theater furniture storage area.

They say to scare yourself every day. What are your daily thrills? Talk about things you’ve found on the roadside.

2021, Family, Farming Update, pets, work

October Already?

66 Comments

Today’s post is from Ben.

Kinda quiet around our farm. The neighbors are all busy and working like crazy, but it’s quiet at our place.

The stuff I write about our farm, it is exactly that, just ‘Our’ farm, it’s certainly not how everyone is doing things or the way anyone else does things. I had someone at the theater comment that they figured I’d be busy farming. No, since I have the neighbors combine my crops, I just wait for them to get here. I try not to get impatient about it. That works best when we have these nice fall days. If the weather starts to crash I have to work harder to stay patient and remind myself it’s out of my control. The neighbors have been doing this for years; they’ll get to it when they get to it. Might be a couple weeks yet if the weather stays nice. Might be November if it’s not.

Corn can stand out there for months without too much damage. Oh, the deer and raccoons get more, but some guys leave it stand until Spring (if they don’t have the animal pressure). But soybeans aren’t so tough. They need to be harvested before we get too much snow. The stalks will break and, depending on the weather, they may not dry out again. The big farmers are going hard on soybeans now, and I know some have already finished and moved into corn. Because you never know when this nice weather will end.

Soybeans go fast; yields are generally 40 – 80 bushels / acre. They don’t need to be dried, so two combines in a field, one dump cart, a couple trucks, haul, dump it in the bin, back to the field. Nothing too it. (Fingers crossed and it all goes well).

Corn takes longer; yields might be over 250 bu / acre. More trucks, more hauling, usually drying time and expense, and it’s just more involved. And if it’s raining or the fields are muddy or something breaks down, it takes longer yet. You just never know. And that’s why the big guys are rushing now even though it seems early.

I have so few acres, they’ll finish my beans one day and corn another. Sometimes my guys fill all their stuff at home, then come over to my place late in the day, fill all the trucks and carts, and finish the next morning.

Sometimes I wonder if I should have my own combine. I saw one at an auction once that sold for $2000. But I’d still need a bean head and a corn head and trucks or wagons. And time. That’s the biggest thing, time. So, I’m really OK waiting for the neighbors to get it. They’ve never missed a crop. One year it was so wet and muddy they had to wait for a freezing cold day to come back and get into one field which was too muddy otherwise. But they always get it. Good neighbors’ matter. (I saw three combines sell at an online auction this past week; a 2005 model sold for $36,500, a 2000 for $34,000, and an older, well used one for $7,600. No heads included. Those sold for $15,000 for the corn head and $12,500 for the bean head. Add another zero at the end for brand new stuff. Roughly.)

As we were talking about enjoy fall on the blog, lately Kelly and I spend some time in the evening sitting on the steps outside the garage. We play with the dogs, watch the chickens settling in, watch the ducks, and just generally enjoy the quiet and the smells and the time.

Kelly tries to get a walk in after work. It’s getting harder as the daylight shortens. The dogs though, they love the walks more than Kelly does. Just once she’d like a walk by herself. The three dogs go nuts when she starts off. Barking, fighting (playing), knocking over the little old Granny dog, Allie. It’s a little bit crazy they’re so excited. And if Kelly lets them out the front door, then she sneaks out the back door, it’s only a matter of time before they sniff her out. She could be up around the corner and out of sight, but they’ll find her. Last night they were circling the house making sure they didn’t miss her. She said it was like being stalked by wolves.

Anything you’re anticipating?

Do you like to walk? What’s the farthest you’ve walked? Got the app showing your steps?  

2021, animals, Business, Family, Farming Update, gardening, Nature, Seasons, Uncategorized

That Fall Smell

51 Comments

The farm report comes to us from Ben

Had a good rainshower Monday afternoon. One of those downpours where traffic slows, and windshield wipers are on high. I could see it coming, I was several miles from home and the sky was dark and I was hitting Every. Red. Light. At one point there was some pea size hail, just a few stones, and I was considering my odds… can I make it home? Where should I park otherwise? But I thought I could make it. (Risk taker, remember?)

And then I could see the rain coming. Boy, just a few times in my life I’ve been in rain that heavy. Thankfully only lasted a mile or so. We ended up with .87”. Thankfully no hard winds with it in our area. I did hear reports of funnel clouds in other areas.

Rain like that in the fall is tough; the crops don’t really need it anymore, and the weather is cool enough it doesn’t dry as fast as it would mid-summer. The corn is tall enough the sun can’t hit the soil and it stays wet for a week. And it just makes harvest harder because now there’s mud to deal with. So, we’ll see how that goes.

I was out checking crops last evening and I noticed that fall smell in the air. The beans are coming along. I saw several farmers out harvesting soybeans in the area today. Soybean pods are fussy; they dry out in the late morning or afternoon, but they’ll pick up moisture after dark or with the dew. Plants along the edge of the field might still be soft and mushy, but the rest of the field is dry, and the pods crack open easy, which is what you need to harvest. The corn is still looking good, it’s roughly 30% moisture which means the ears haven’t tipped down yet. Too much rain and it gets down inside the husk and can cause mold issues on the kernels. Once the corn dries more and the ears tip down, rain won’t cause mold issues.

After the discussion last week on PTO shafts, I was thinking about how some other things have changed.

Hooking up wagons or implements is different these days. One of the greatest inventions is the extendable wagon hitch. LIFECHANGING! Back when tractors were smaller and didn’t have cabs, it was easy to just look over your shoulder and you were almost looking right down at the hitch (called a drawbar) so backing up to a wagon was easy and we got real good at getting lined up so the hitch pin would drop right in. And the tractor or wagon was small enough we could nudge it a little bit to make the connection.

With a cab, sightlines changed and sometimes it’s harder to see the hole in the drawbar, so it was harder to get lined up right. Some people have added mirrors to the rear window so when the window is open, it allows one to see the hitch. (I need to do that on one of my tractors).

But now, with extendable hitches, as long as we get close, we can extend the wagon hitch to connect it, then we back up and it locks back into place. It’s wonderful! Especially when hooking a wagon to another implement, so I’m guessing where that hitch is way back there; the extendable tongues are life savers!

I remember the first wagon Dad bought with an extendable hitch. It was a remarkable thing.

Hitch pins too – at first, they were just pieces of straight rod with a washer welded on the top. Or even a large bolt if you were desperate. But again, machinery got bigger.

I made a couple hitch pins in high school welding class; that’s where I learned about hardening and how to temper them so they didn’t wear out so fast.

I had no idea I had so many hitch pins until I got them all together for this photo.

Then seed dealers started giving away hitch pins with an ACTUAL HANDLE on the top! That was another wonderful revelation! Course, on a hill it was easy for that hitch back there to drag on the ground and push the hitch pin right out. I ran one wagon through a fence and down into the calf pen when the pin came out… didn’t break anything or lose any bales, just the wagon. (And had to fix the fence). Lost the pin on the grain drill one day and didn’t notice until I got home and didn’t have a drill behind me anymore. One time the anhydrous tank came unhooked from the applicator. Knew that right away and thank goodness I was on flat ground and thanks goodness for the safety disconnect valve that separated. But getting it all hooked back up again was a struggle.

If you wanted to be safe, you put a clip in the hole at the bottom of the pin. If there WAS a hole for a clip. IF it stayed when going through cornstalks.  Again, tractors and implements have gotten bigger Now I use locking pins that might be 5/8” or even 7/8” diameter. And the big tractor has something called a ‘Hammerstrap’ hitch that’s about 1 1/2” diameter. And it will actually drop itself in! (if I back up straight and hit the hitch of the implement just right. It works pretty well and it makes me laugh when It does).

In this photo the PTO shaft is the round thing above the hitch.  Bigger tractors might have a pin as big as your wrist. If you imagine the pull on these machines when they’re in the ground, you can imagine why they might need a pin this big.

Duck Report. The three older ones and the younger ones are just starting to hang out together. And nobody goes in the pen anymore; they just hang out down here by the pond.

I saw a duck get a little air the other day… just a few feet, but I’ll bet it’s coming soon.

What do you remember changing your life? What’s coming soon for you?

2021, animals, Family, Farming Update, Technology, Uncategorized

Baling and Traffic and Duck

104 Comments

Today’s Farm Report comes to us from Ben.

Mornings are cool enough I wear a jacket going to the college but don’t need it when walking back to the car after work. Starting to get some color on the trees.

Soybeans are mostly pretty yellow and the leaves are starting to fall off them. Beans are drying and they will be ready in a couple weeks. But if there’s too many weeds in the field, they won’t be able to combine until the weeds freeze or die. Combines are not made to handle green material; that just plugs them up. The entire threshing process is based on dry material shelling out easily.

Remember that field of soybeans my neighbors planted on July 8th? It’s looking pretty good; they sure got lucky with the rains. They’re taller than mine and setting pods. They’re not done yet and they still need some time before a freeze, but they’re looking good so far.

The dairy guys are chopping corn silage. That’s one of the things I miss from milking; I enjoyed chopping corn. It smells good, it blows up the silos easy and doesn’t plug up the pipe, and cutting up that entire cornstalk just looks cool.

I baled some small square hay bales for our neighbors. A field next to our property but on the other side of a swamp and creek and power line and you can’t get there from here. But still cool to be on the ‘other side’ of the world from our place. Driving over there with the tractor, baler, and a wagon involved about 4 miles on a busy highway. Some people are terrible about dealing with farm machinery. They pass on corners, they tail gate for a 1 /4 mile then abruptly pass. It’s just ridiculous, not to mention dangerous to all of us.  I can’t print the words I say about them. I always hope I’m bigger than them so that will protect me, but please, harvest season is coming, give farmers and the machinery some space and don’t pass when you shouldn’t. You can bet I’m wearing my seatbelt and I have all the tractor lights on, flashers on, SMV signs… it’s not that they don’t see me, but they figure they can pass me quick enough so it doesn’t matter if it’s a corner. Makes me mad writing about it.

PTO – Power Take Off shafts. It’s the thing that takes power from the tractor and puts it in whatever implement is being powered. For a lot of machinery, that shaft spins at 540 RPM, some things spin at 1000 RPM. In the old days it was just an exposed shaft and safety wasn’t even on the radar. These days, there’s always a cover or shield, but they can still break or wear out and they’re usually in the way at some point. It’s the end that hooks to the tractor that’s the tricky part. In trying to make them safer, manufacturers have tried different styles and ways to protect people from the spinning bits. Some styles are easier than others; buttons to push while sliding them together or collars to pull back while still pushing the implement shaft onto the tractor shaft. There’s one attachment that’s completely covered, but then you can’t see inside to grease it either. Many of those end up cut away enough to get a grease gun in there.

It’s a necessary safety item – a lot of people have been killed or injured from contact with unprotected spinning shafts, but it’s inconvenient. I was thinking about all this while hooking up the baler to the tractor last week and connecting the PTO shaft.  

I know you’re all waiting for the weekly duck report. I took their fence down the other day. I started to roll it up, but I thought I shouldn’t change too much too quick, so I left part of it for reference for them. And one night, 4 brown ducks simply could not figure out how to get back into the pen they’ve been in for the last 2 months. Round and round the barn they went until finally they spent the night in with the chickens. And the next night they figured it out. It’s a mystery. I hate to call them dumb, but gee whiz.

The Mallard ducklings are starting to run and flap their wings. I assume they don’t know they can fly if no one is there to show them they can, and they’ll have to figure it out on their own. I assume instinct will tell them they need to head south. And other years there would be random ducks that would sort of stop in to visit. So, I think they’ll get it figured out I’m just very curious as to how and when.

At our townboard meeting last night the sheriff deputy gave us his report on township activities. Aside from the usual traffic stops, animal calls, or serving papers, a driver was arrested and charged with a DWI. He lived in the area where he was arrested, but prior to his arrest, it looked like it might become a pursuit. Then he turned down a dead-end road, cut into some back yards, and figured he could come back out on the road and get away. Except he came back on the road face to face with four other deputies. Oops.

Bypassed any safety items lately? Why?

What’s overregulated in your life?  

2021, animals, Family, Farming Update, gardening, holidays, home, Kids, Nature, Seasons, Technology, Uncategorized, Weather

September Farm

49 Comments

The farm report comes to us from Ben.

We had some friends and their kids visit and we had a good time giving tractor rides and gator rides and collecting eggs and seeing cows. It’s always fun giving farm tours.

I finally got around to working on the brush mower. I had to order bigger sockets to get the nut off the broken spindle on the big spinny thing. (It’s 45mm by the way) And then trying to get the gear box off the mower deck, I didn’t have the right size sockets for that either. It’s 30mm. I am getting more and more metric tools, but I didn’t have anything that big. I have a 3/8” drive socket set that I use for a lot of things. And a 1/2” drive set for some of the bigger stuff. And then I started buying 3/4” drive stuff for the really big stuff. (I mean the size of the square on the head of the ratchet is 3/8” or 1/2” or 3/4”). Then I put a 3’ long pipe over the handle to get enough leverage to get the nuts loose. Took the gear box up to John Deere for them to fix.

How’s that go: Every job is an opportunity for a new tool. Worked here.

On the way home from John Deere I stopped at a farm stand and bought 4 dozen ears of sweet corn. A couple kids run this stand and it is really good corn. Got that frozen and it will be really good this winter.

My mom has a possible Covid exposure from one of her physical therapy people. I had seen her on Sunday, and she found that out on Monday. But she hasn’t tested positive herself yet and they all wear masks and mom is vaccinated and I’d think the PT person was too. So hopefully she stays good. She needs to isolate in her room, which she isn’t very happy about. And her food comes in a Styrofoam container with plastic cutlery and that’s her biggest complaint. We had a care conference Tuesday and there seems to be exceptions for everything so she’s gotten real plates now. Hope that keeps up.

Monday was Labor Day and I wondered if I should really take the day off or do some work. If I didn’t do anything I’d feel guilty. I took a nap first off. But then decided to clean up the swather and get that put away. I washed it off and oiled the chains, loosened some belts, and filled the gas tank and added some ‘Stabil’ to the fuel, and tucked it into the shed for winter.

Then decided it was a good day to burn a small brush pile behind the shed. Got that burning and cut some grass while keeping an eye on it.

We’re having a little experiment with the ducks. When they go into the pen at night, they can either walk up a ramp or they can hop up onto a block and then into the open door. Most of them seem to hop in. One day I had not put the ramp in the door, it was sitting down on the block. Everyone had gone in except one black duck and two brown ducks. They were very distressed to be outside on their own and I finally went down and put the ramp up and one brown duck went up the ramp and the other two hopped in from the block. Hmm, were the other two moral support for the ramp duck?

This is very curious, so the next night I also left the ramp down and everyone had gotten in except a black duck and a brown duck. I put the ramp back up and both ducks hopped in without using the ramp.
The third night I put the ramp in the door right away. About dusk everyone heads over to the door and the white ducks always go first and hop on the block and up into the door. Might take them two tries, but they make it. Eventually the ones waiting got tired of waiting in line and they all went and got a drink and then came back and some more hopped in, and again, the remaining few got tired of the queue, went and got another drink and then came back and no one used the ramp and everyone hopped in. Evidently the ramp is more emotional support or a guide? It’s very interesting.

FOURTH NIGHT! I had the ramp up and I watched closer; they seem to use the ramp as a guide rail. A few actually use it, some bump against the side while hopping in, and some jump up onto the ramp about 1/2 way up. Very curious. And when they come out in the morning, it’s last in, first out.

When I got home one day, all the ducks were out of their pen. We’d been talking about letting them out; they’re old enough and big enough, but being ‘adolescent’, they don’t always make the best choices and we lose a few to coyotes. That day they found a hole – or maybe ‘made’ a hole and they were all close, just on the wrong side of the fence. It wasn’t too hard to round them up, patch the hole, and get them all back inside. And then I noticed one of the white ones has a wound under one wing. Neither Kelly or I were working from home that day which makes me wonder; maybe a coyote came in the yard and caused a commotion which is what scared them out. Kelly says every day around noon there is some kind of commotion, and the dogs bark and guineas get upset so there’s something going on.

I showed Kelly how to fire the rifle and the next day, when the noon commotion began, she fired a shot. We never see anything, but we’re trying to scare it– whatever “it” is– away. Kelly really wants to shoot a coyote but she’s having trouble making the scope work for her. She is just hoping for plain, dumb luck. And she’s going to work on firing from the hip.

Chickens; they get into the ducks pen, but they can’t ever figure out how to get back out…

BONUS! Two Sandhill Cranes standing in the field when I left for work the other day.

There has been a pair here all summer, we don’t see them, we only hear them. I’m guessing this is another pair passing through.

Can you fire from the hip? And accomplish what you are trying to accomplish?

2021, animals, Family, Farming Update, Food, gardening, Nature, Uncategorized, Weather

Fall is in the Air

49 Comments

This weekend’s farm report comes to us from Ben.

Fall is in the air this week. It’s good weather for sleeping; I love it. The soybeans are starting to turn yellow, and they’ll be losing their leaves soon. And with the recent rains the pastures have greened up again. Another inch of nice, slow, steady rain here recently.

Remember a few months ago I left the top lid open on the feed bin and had to spend an afternoon clearing out the rotten corn and gunk. And it was almost empty, thankfully, and there was still a bit of rotten corn stuck to the sides at the bottom. Since I needed to order more feed, now was the time to clean it all out. I wanted to knock loose a little more good corn so I’d have enough to feed the chickens and ducks for a couple days.

First thing I did was drop my long stick into the auger and jam it up. Belt squealing and I’m 15’ feet up the bin so I carefully, hurriedly, scramble down and turn off the breaker. Then I turn the auger backwards, back up the bin to remove the stick, back down to turn on the breaker again, and back up to finish knocking some corn down.

The bin has an 18” opening at the bottom and then a transition angle attached to that which turns it vertical, and then the auger attaches to that. I removed a clamp and the auger attachment, and the auger slid down and out of place. That’s going to be a problem when I get to putting it all back together. The auger is 4” diameter and about 10’ long and goes up through the wall of the feed room with the electric motor attached to the end of the auger in there. I removed the clamp and transition attachment, and then I put a tarp under the opening and climb back up the bin with my stick and start knocking corn off the walls. I’d knock some loose, pull the tarp out and dump it in the loader bucket, then put the tarp back down and knock more corn off. Took 4 cycles.  It wasn’t as bad as I thought it might be. But getting it all put back together took two people, a strap, some C-clamps, a stick, some muscle, and some time.  It might be the first time I’ve cleaned the bin out in 20 or 30 years. Good for another 30 years.

Kelly helped me get the seed cup put back on the grain drill and the 44 bolts reinstalled, so that part is ready to go. I still have some other work to do on the drill, but I can manage that on my own. The 44 bolts took two people with one inside holding the wrench on the head, and me outside tightening the nut. Replacing the seed cup means I don’t have an excuse for leaving gaps in the field anymore. Next year if there’s a gap between the rows it’s my fault for not driving straight.

The next thing to repair is the ‘big spinny thing’ under the brush mower. I got the blades and broken shaft off the spinny part. Now I need Kelly’s help again to get the 8 bolts off the gearbox and take that off the mower itself. Maybe this weekend.

The former oat fields are getting a lot of weeds growing in them now. Bailey and I got them dug up. It needs to be done before they get too big (and before they go to seed) or they will plug up the digger. I try not to go the same way across the field every time I work it up. My fields are not square, and while I’m still trying to follow the contours, it helps to start on the opposite end of the field sometimes and just break up those ridges underneath the soil.

I had the co-op come and take soil samples off the oat fields. Normally you need to do that either in the spring or the fall after the crop is off. Can’t test during the growing season of course but since the oats is done, it was a good time to do those fields. I haven’t seen the results yet.

The remodeling work at one of the local theaters continues and there’s been a good crew in helping with that. If we ever get the flooring done (Thanks to Wes for advice), the bathroom stalls will be the next major job. They came in two dozen pieces and multiple bags of bolts.

In class this week the lab was on topographical maps and reading the contours and an online test on seafloor spreading and continental plates. I learned about Earthquakes, Volcanos, and the Earth’s magnetic field being generated in the core of the earth and that the magnetic field has changed polarity multiple times over the years. The last change was about 1 million years ago.

The only thing we are managing to produce out of our garden is cucumbers.  I make a lot of refrigerator pickles. Neither Kelly or I learned how to can things or preserve things and it’s probably not hard, but it is hard to find the time. At least I can grow cucumbers. Something has gotten in the garden and ate all the potatoes and kohlrabi. All summer something has been in there and I can’t find a hole in the fence, but they leave the cucumbers alone.

And the ducks. They’re getting real nice ‘poofs’ on their heads and some are off to the side like a jaunty little chapeau. I spend a lot of time just watching the ducks play in the water. They are good jumpers being able to hop into one of the water containers. I spend a lot of time watching the ducks.

Got any stories about magnets? Our son stuck one on the TV and messed up the picture and we had to buy a new TV.

Have you been in an Earthquake or seen an active Volcano?

2021, Farming Update, Uncategorized, work

College, Ducks, and Corn

102 Comments

Today’s post comes from Ben

Typically, there isn’t a lot going on in August once the oats and straw is done. One year it rained a lot and oats was late and straw kept getting delayed and I was still doing straw in September and that just made me grumpy. But usually, August is a pretty quiet month.

College classes started so I’ve got homework again. ‘MN Rocks and Waters’. This first week is plate tectonics and continental drift. It’s interesting but there sure are a lot of terms and I hope I don’t have to memorize all of them.

I’ve been picking some corn ears, looking at plant health, and monitoring progress. The plant looks pretty good; not seeing any fungal diseases (which wouldn’t be expected in a dry year like this) Some ears look better than other ears.

Most have above average girth counting 16 or 18 around (it will always an even number) and length varies. Good ones count 42 kernels long. Shorter ones count 30. There are ways to estimate final yield by doing the math. We’ll see. I won’t bore you with the details. It doesn’t take into account how many deer are out there anyway.

Soybeans are looking OK too. Starting to turn yellow (meaning maturing) and it’s interesting you don’t hear so much about estimating soybean yield. Not a perfect science perhaps.

The ducks have learned to spend the day outside and go back in at night. It’s still wet inside their pen no matter how often I clean it. It’s the end of the pen where the water is, they’re just sloppy drinkers.  Kelly and I were talking that we don’t remember if they’re always this skittish. There is a breed called ‘Indian Runners’ and they’re always totally crazy. But I just don’t remember if these breeds are usually so nervous. Maybe it’s the mallards? Maybe in another month they’ll mellow out a bit. After all, they’re just barely a month old. It’s impressive how fast they grow.

I gathered up all the round bales of straw and put them in a line. Just so they’re not scattered all over the fields and to make it easier for the guys to pick up later.

If there was alfalfa hay growing under the oats it would be important to move them as soon as possible so as not to kill the alfalfa. But in this case, I’ll be digging up the field in another week or two simply to control weeds. And since I don’t know when they’ll pick them up, this may be a snow fence too.

I got parts for the grain drill that I want to get put back on this fall. And some new parts for the corn planter I could be working on.

My mom is adjusting to her room in the Long Term Care area. One day she said the bad was outweighing the good. But she says good things about the staff, and she gets ice cream every day, and yesterday she said she’s almost ready to call it home.

With rain predicted for the next few days I cleaned gutters out this morning. One was more involved than expected; it wasn’t just cleaning the leaves out from the top; it was pulling off an extension under the deck and snaking a hose up in there to flush it out.

Do you wear any rings? What is/was your wedding ring like?