Prep Work and Planting

Well the crazy season is almost coming to an end, so I better get everyone caught up!
 In early April we disked, shredded stalks, row stalked (cutting the old roots or "crown" out of the old row), chisled and I even got in on the action a few days I was off from my paying job. This was a very windy, dry dirt flying kind of day. What you can't see from this picture is I was actually trying to follow a not real distinct line in the dirt through this cloud of dirt, and I'm sure I had people driving by wondering what I was trying to get accomplished! My mission that day was to drive like I was shown, turn nicely and not hit any power poles, signs or such next to the road. And to do this with a tractor that when it was new cost more than a nice large house and has tires taller than me. Needless to say I was a bit out of my comfort zone but lived to tell about it, hit nothing and felt like I actually helped to keep life functioning for my planting farmer.

This is a chisel for tearing up ground that has been compacted.

This is the row stalker.

 Then the planter preparations were in full swing, well the last minute ones at least. The planter usually spends a chunk of winter in the shop making sure it is ready to go and then when we are just about ready to plant, it gets a finishing walk through and finally is all back together for the season. Chris called to have us bring snacks after school one day so the girls got to help a little too.

The planter without seed and chemical boxes.

These plastic discs will pick up and distribute the seed one by one through the planter

The seed box off of the planter, waiting for its new plate.

The girls getting dirty and helping!

This box is ready to be installed on the planter bar.

And FINALLY planting season could begin! 

Chris took a short video, so you can ride along for a minute.

 

And some pictures of the planter from my view (which is usually running lunch or taking parts :)

And as crazy as this all was, we also had our branding (which is another soon to come post), spring music programs, Easter celebrations and the start of summer softball. I'm tired just trying to remember what I missed!

~Spring is in the Air~

It is officially Spring! We are thankful to see more and more daylight every day around here and I think most of the family is recovered from the "Spring Forward" time change (I personally really dislike daylight savings time, it is hard on all of us in this house).

The guys have continued to be busy with cows and baby calves but births seem to be slowing down some and they have moved all of the cattle into the pasture and off of cornstalks so field preparations can begin.  Chris has enjoyed some nice long days with the tractor and disk getting the fields ready to start planting next month. In our area it is common to use "no-till" field practices to prevent soil erosion and maintain what little soil moisture we have. Basically what that means is that after we harvest we will leave the corn "stubble" or remaining stalks in the field and do not tear up the soil. Many times we would run a machine called a row stalker down the row to cut the old stalk and root ball out and be ready to plant right back into that row again. This year we have a few fields that need a little more tillage to get them ready for planting so the disk will be used to tear up the remaining rows completely. This allows the soil to absorb any spring moisture better and allows for the GPS in the tractor to plant straighter new rows and not attempt to travel in an older, possibly crooked row. Planting straight rows allows us to water more efficiently in our gravity irrigated fields and also allows more corn to be planted in the same space than just trying to drive a straight path like we did before we had GPS and auto steering capabilities.

The tractor and disk driving through a corn field.

The field before

The field after disking.

Close up of the remaining root ball from last years corn plant.

The view from the cab looking back over the disk and the seagulls that follow looking for worms and bugs. These birds will follow the tractor all day just for the easy meal. And you can also see in this picture the angle it takes to go across the rows to get optimal results.

Beginning Again

Well we have been extremely busy the past 2 1/2 years, so much so that keeping up the blog took a direct hit and as you can see, it has not been updated since Fall of 2011. Wow! We have so much to share but I will try to make this as short as possible. I was accepted into the Physical Therapist Assistant program at San Juan College and started those classes in January of 2012. Chris had an ATV accident at work on the farm in March of 2012 which had him healing a broken pelvis at home, his family scrambling to get ready for planting season and moving cows back out to pasture, while I worked and prepared to make my first of 5 trips to New Mexico. Our world went completely crazy but we have persevered, healed and just kept moving.

Fast forward to 2014. I have graduated and passed my boards! Chris, his dad Mark and brothers Shane and Marcus have been very busy with the farm and cattle after his Grandfather retired from the day to day farm work. They also have been dealing with extra stress the drought we have been in the last 3 years has brought on. Our girls are bigger and busier than ever and life continues to bring us challenges and new adventures.

 It seems only fitting that this year we start up blogging again with calving season. The winter has been cold but busy with new calves daily at the farm. The cows started calving the end of January and this week it was warm enough that our girls got to out and watch an actual birth. They have been around baby calves quite a bit but having the good timing to get to see one being born was very exciting for them. Jordan was so excited, she even got in on the picture taking action!

This baby is just minutes old and is still covered in part of the amniotic sac.

Looking a little cleaner and cuter now after a few minutes, this calf has a great momma getting it cleaned and warmed up. This calf will be up walking and ready for it's first meal soon.

 

This calf is a little older and curious why I am hanging out of the truck taking pictures.  (It was very windy here this week)

This one says its dinner time.

Spring is just around the corner and we will begin field work soon, but for right now the world at the farm revolves around these girls and their babies, and while the guys are plenty tired they wouldn't trade it for anything.

Beans and baby calves!

Beans, beans, beans!!!

These soybeans are all dried up and ready to be cut. You can see the fuzz still on the pods but if you grab one, the fuzz will come off and the pod is likely to spill the beans~sorry couldn't help myself :)

 A good look at the field from the front of the combine. To the left are the rows already cut and to the right are the rows Chris is working on. These were irrigated beans and made about 73 bushels per acre.

And this is what a whole trailer full of beans looks like. This load is ready for the trip to the elevator.

We are almost done with the soybean harvest here, had it not been for a welcome little vacation due to a good amount (almost three inches here) of much needed rain we would be on to the corn already. However we also had multiple fires in the area last week because of the hot, dry and very windy conditions so we just smiled and enjoyed it when the drops started falling.  Praise the Lord for all of the dedicated firefighters and volunteers that saved as much as they did, it was really amazing!

We were also blessed with a welcome chore last week! One of the fall calving cows had a set of twins so the whole family has taken turns bottle feeding the little guy pictured below. Twins are fairly common in cows and many cows have to have help to feed both of them. This calf was the smaller of the two so he got to come to the barn and be bottle fed until we have another cow to put him on. I have to say this is one of my favorite farm activities and it is never complained about by our girls either :)

He is a fiesty little bull calf, and both girls were a little surprised by his sucking and head butting strength already, this picture was taken when he was just four days old.

Up close, such a cute little guy! Hard to believe he will be almost full grown by this time next year.

Where has the time gone?

Wow feeling a little discouraged about not getting back to the blog to keep everyone updated, but the beginning of the school year has us all running ragged.

We started August off with a bang and picked and put up sweetcorn for the winter. We even included a few friends of ours that had not enjoyed the experience before and made a day of it. We did the whole process in one Saturday from picking at 8 am to ending all cleaned up about 3 pm. We shuck, wash, blanch, cool, cut and bag our corn to go into the freezer. Everyone seems to have a little different process but this one works great for us.

Going in to pick the corn-you can't see Klayton but he is getting a lesson on which plants to pick from (we had a little trouble with some mixed seed this year)

 The back of the pick up getting loaded up.

 Jordan and Jenna-we were all soaking wet from the dew by the time we were done :)

 I forgot to get the camera back out while we were shucking but after that we started cleaning the silks off of the corn.

        The guys doing a fine job of cooking

After its cooked it takes a nice cold bath to shock the corn to keep it from over cooking

The kids eating a little for lunch-Owen got to have his off the cob for the first time-he loved it!

 Cutting and bagging-I have to say a little painter's plastic is a great investment-we cover everything to save a little clean up later-all that sweet corn sugar is sticky :)

And finally the bags of corn ready for the freezer! We will enjoy these until next summer's corn is ready.

 And in the middle of August, Jordan and Mom started back to school. In class for her and on-line for me after work.




Jordan's first day of school, getting on the bus. Holy cow 3rd grade already!








We also got to take in the Nebraska State Fair in Grand Island for the first time. The kids and I posing for a picture in the exhibition building. I was truly impressed by the new fairgrounds and great 4-H exhibits!

 And checking in on the crops......

This is what the corn was looking like at the end of August. It is beginning to dry out but the cob is still soft with moisture and nutrients it is taking out of the plant to feed the kernels.


This is what the outside of the ear looks like, this corn is starting to dent which is a good indication the corn is maturing properly.

 Some round kernels that have not started to dent, but are dry enough to not be broken by my thumb nail.

Mature ears now have brown, dry silks.

And Jenna finally got to start preschool in September, she loves going to school again like her sister!

We are now a little more back into the swing of things with school for the girls, however this Mom is feeling the pressure of family, jobs, farm, her own classes, outside commitments and keeping the house in some kind of order. Sadly, now that harvest is officially upon us so it will probably only get worse. Harvest is a loved and hated time for many of us, as it means loooonngg hours for the guys in the fields and less time for them to be home with family. But the end reward is always fabulous seeing a crops out from the field, happy men at home and payment in the bank. Chris started picking soybeans this week with the dry land acres running about 30 bushels per acre and the irrigated fields running much better in the 65-70 range. The irrigated plants produce much better in our hot summer sun and with very little rain in July and August this year the dry land really produced as well as could be expected. The harvest in our area is really just getting started good with silage being about done for most, wet corn is starting to come out and is either going through dryers or being ground up for feedlot use. Our dry corn will be starting soon with many reports of 20-25 moisture around the area and 15 being the prime moisture target for many of us taking it to the local co-ops. We wish all of you a happy harvest season!! And I promise more pictures of harvest will be coming soon.

July Part 2

Wow have we been busy bees this month-I've tried to narrow it down a little for posting but I'm going to have to start getting to this a little more often when things are going and growing this fast. We are officially into wheat harvest as of last Saturday, which for us is incredibly late but we won't complain about the all the free moisture we've been receiving either :) Here are some pictures of wheat harvest for us-this is not one of our main crops, we use wheat mostly for dry land spots and rotation for moisture control but I still love the color of dried wheat, it truly is gold in the field.

Dry wheat right before it was cut and the front and rear view of the combine moving right along

 

Filling the truck to take the wheat to town

This is the inside of the combine, the view
 from the cab right after they emptied

Getting filled up again

 Along with trying to get the wheat out of the field we are also trying to keep the corn watered. Right now the corn is pollinating so it is very important to keep the plants from being too stressed so they produce well. The mid-summer heat wave we are in has kept the temperatures well above 90 and the heat index over 100 degrees so water is extremely important right now. The corn plants are starting to grow ears and are now well over nine feet tall!  We are also trying to ridge the remaining soybeans that are looking better and bigger too.

Beans out the back window being ridged and across the field

Jenna helping carry socks

New ears!

Jordan showing how tall the corn is now

Look at those tassels-that is where the pollen is in the corn plant

We also hid inside from the heat for a day to celebrate Jenna's birthday, can you tell she is very into Tangled right now :)

And this is what happens when we are busy in the field, busy with homework, yard work and housework (the pile of clean clothes we lovingly call Mt. Laundry-we aren't proud of it but it happens so all we can do is laugh) 

 Dinner from the garden-we love summer at our house-fresh summer squash with fresh basil, green beans and cucumbers and farm grown beef we just got back from the butcher. It truly does not get much better than this-unless we fix steak instead!!!

Well I am off to another round of homework to keep up with my classes and maybe finish folding more clothes :) Hope the summer is treating you all well and the heat isn't too unbearable!