You Might Be A Farmer If ...

You might be a farmer if you are secretly thrilled to bring in the first load of a crop to your local elevator.

OK, maybe it's not such a secret thrill.

Jeff Foxworthy might not have used that particular attribute in his "You might be a farmer if ..." list. However, some other of his observations seem to fit, too: 

You Might be a Farmer ...

• If using an elevator relates to grain harvest rather than in a tall city building. 
  
• If regular social conversation with your friends at the local cafe involves rainfall, equipment repairs, hybrids or herbicides. 
• If the 5-gallon buckets hydraulic oil comes in are almost as valuable a tool as the oil for feeding livestock or for portable parts or tool storage, and you’ve never ever thrown one away that was not busted.
• If you refer to land using the names of the farmers who owned them a generation ago.
• You own a ton of hats (mostly free) but continue to wear the same one or two of them.
  

 

But if Jeff Foxworthy had thought of it, he might have used the "first to the elevator pride" as a common denominator for farmers, too.

We brought our first truckload of the 2020 corn harvest to Zenith last Thursday, August 27. And we were first there. While other farmers have been cutting some high-moisture corn and hauling it to the feedlot, we cut the first dry loads of corn to arrive at the Zenith branch of the Kanza Co-op. Then, on Friday, we were the first at the Stafford branch, too.

However, a cold front with some moisture arrived on Saturday, so corn harvest came to a standstill over the weekend. It was still too wet on Monday, too. We'll see what today brings.

We are primarily wheat farmers. Last year, because of weather conditions that prevented wheat planting in fall 2018, we raised corn on 600 acres. This year, we are back to 180 acres committed to corn. 

We planted a 100-day corn, meaning it's estimated to be 100 days between planting and harvest. (As a comparison, my brother in Pratt County planted a 114-day variety.) 

This year, we began planting corn on April 20 and finished on April 28. To harvest the corn, our combine uses an eight-row header. (In the photo below, you can't see all eight rows.)

I think they look a little like missiles as they move down between the rows. The corn ears are pulled off the corn stalk and are dragged into the combine with rollers. Inside the combine, the corn kernels are separated from the husks and cobs. Then the cobs and debris are dispersed out the back of the combine.

 Once the combine bin gets full ...

... it's time to dump it into the truck. 

 

Many farmers have a grain cart pulled by a tractor to do this step, but we unload from the combine directly into the truck.

If the weather cooperates, we'll be done in a couple of days.

So far, Randy has been pleased with the yields, but a final tally will come once all the grain is delivered to the co-op. 

You might be a farmer if "yield" means bushels - not a sign on a highway.