WE’RE DONE!!

We’re done with summer harvest!!!!

Peas for freezing – Check
Crimson Clover for seed – Check
Perennial Ryegrass for Seed – Check
Wheat for Seed – Check

Combining wheat is always a little more fun than ryegrass I think.  Mostly because you get to cut while you combine.  In perennial ryegrass we have to swath at night, wait a week, then combine the already cut rows that look like this.

wpid-2013-07-19_17-41-09_902.jpgBut in wheat, we make the haircut while also separating the crop from the straw.  It looks like this:

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We also get to dump on the go, the combine never stops (unless you have a girl like me driving and you have to use the bathroom every hour, sorry dad!)

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While in the cab you can look ta see the quality of the wheat that you’re combining by just looking through the window at the rear of the cab.

2013-08-07_11-53-47_9852013-08-07_12-41-50_164Here’s a picture of the final “Mohawk” I like to call it of wheat in our field.

2013-08-08_17-13-50_671And here’s one of how I felt when we were finally done!

2013-08-08_17-17-36_717A finished up wheat field, time to head for the barn!

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Homestretch of Harvest

We have hit the homestretch of our summer harvest here!  We have just about 4 more days and (fingers crossed) we’ll be putting away the combines for the season.  That doesn’t mean that we’re done with summer work though, quite the opposite.

Because of the large diversity of crops you can grow here, our rotations are always changing.  And most of the rotations are planted in the fall.  Which means the moment that you get the crop from last year off the ground, it’s time to turn around, flail (mow) the field of last year’s crop, work the ground, get soil tests, and get the dirt ready to be planted for the next year. Right now we have 4 fields coming out of perennial ryegrass, 1 field coming out of peas, 3 fields that are done with crimson clover, and 2 fields that are going to be finished up soon from a wheat crop.  This equates to about half our farm that will change over this fall to new crops!  That’s no small amount of diesel, time and effort!

60095_10200864066777149_742203434_nHaving my little niece come out to say hi makes a day go by much faster!

We had a visitor out the the farm awhile back, as a person who has traveled the world visiting farms and ranches, he was amazed that we had teenagers driving our harvesting equipment.  “It has been my experience that usually it’s the boss or the most senior worker who runs the harvesters, it’s crazy to see young kids up there!”  But in this area, we don’t just have one crop to get off the ground and into the bin.  We have that, but then we also have tractor work going on, mouse bait to spread (because of the geese in our area we only have a small window to get this on), plus all the stuff that I break has to be fixed, the list just goes on and on.  There’s not a lot of room for the boss to jump on a combine for three weeks.

So as well all stumble into work today, thinking about just a few more 15 hour days ahead of us, it does feel good to know that most of harvest is behind us and it’s time to move forward to next year’s crop, taking care of the land, and getting it all planted, so it can produce another round of good crops in 2014!

 

 

Hurry Up and Wait…

We finally finished up our third crop harvest.

1. Peas
2. Crimson Clover Seed
3. Perennial Ryegrass Seed

So after a month of beautiful weather, we finished grass harvest and hurried up to get the wheat header on, get the combine all cleaned up and set out to harvest some wheat…and then the weather changed.  It went from blue skies over the crop like this…

2013-07-25_19-45-05_1402013-07-25_19-46-13_476To a view more like this…with a wheat truck parked, patiently waiting for some sunshine.

2013-08-02_06-03-22_371I’m not complaining, this has been about the best weather a farmer could ask for the past month, so having to hurry up and wait this one time…no problem here!

2013-08-02_06-59-26_148And while other parts of the country are nervous about drones…we get to look at beautiful hot air balloons on nice calm mornings like this! Hope everyone has a wonderful end of the week and weekend!