First Day of "School" Jitters: Harvest 2019

Remember that anxious feeling in the pit of your stomach before the school year started each August? There was excitement, but there was also an undercurrent of nervous energy and uncertainty. Would you understand the concepts of Geometry? (Not without sitting at Mr. Bisel's desk for a little one-on-one time.) Would friendship triumph over the girl drama?

There's been a little of that feeling going on at The County Line this June. We finally got started with Harvest 2019 late yesterday afternoon, June 26.  It started better than last year when we sent a raccoon through the combine before ever cutting a swath.

This year, the anxiety was mainly about when we would finally begin. Rain has delayed harvest and caused a later start than we've ever experienced in our 38 years of farming together. I have a record of the start dates since I've been blogging:

2010:  June 18
2011:  June 10
2012:  May 26 (an anomaly and the earliest harvest, by far, we've ever had)
2013:  June 21
2014:  June 17
2015:  June 20
2016:  June 15
2017:  June 12
2018: June 12
2019: June 26

 

Randy thought the ground would be hard to maneuver because of the repeated rains. And while he did go around a lot of mud holes, he didn't have to call for a pullout. Fingers crossed. However, we do have the chain on the big tractor ... just in case.

There's a pond on the ground where we were harvesting last evening. I sent a photo to the landlord, and she didn't recognize it. Her dad had constructed the pond about the time he retired. And she said she'd never seen it look so full. With the old cottonwoods' leaves glistening in the evening sun and the bright blue against the golden wheat, it was undeniably pretty.

(This photo was taken through the window as I was riding with Randy, so it's kind of blurry)

In the background of the photo above, you can also see the water still standing in the field across the road from where we were harvesting. That's not a pond, but it has a lot of water - just like most fields around here.

"Dessert" after bringing dinner to the field last evening was my first combine ride of Harvest 2019 with my favorite farmer. There will be opportunities for plenty more evening "dates." However, we don't have quite as much wheat to harvest as usual, since last October's deluge of rain prevented us from planting nearly 400 planned wheat acres.

Sunset - October 25, 2018

 
Still, my farmer was happy to get the machine rolling. I'm sure there will be more (and better) photos to come! Let's just hope the stories aren't as "exciting" as raccoons and hiring oilfield machinery to pull us out of mud and mire. We could use a happy ending to this saga that began last fall.

The Last Hurrah: A Farm Update

"The last hurrah" for an aging alfalfa field has been a bright spot in a cloudy (literally) spring.

At the end of March, Randy planted oats in an alfalfa field he plans to retire after this growing season. An alfalfa field is productive about 7 to 8 years. This final cutting will provide a mixture of alfalfa and oats that we will bale up for cattle feed.

 

The excessive rain we've gotten since last fall has been a challenge in many aspects. But as Randy stood in the waist-high oats, it was obvious that like the Luke Brian song says, "Rain is a good thing" ... at least, for this field.

After Randy got to the end of a swath, he got off the tractor to tell me, "This is fun!"

Even the alfalfa has grown taller than normal, as it's tried to climb high enough to reach the sun from the canopy created by the taller oats. You can see its purple flowers among the oats.

The oats had reached the soft dough stage when they were swathed.

The oats and alfalfa are so lush that Randy had to move slowly through the field, more like swathing sudan than alfalfa.

Each swath left behind big windrows.

 

Unfortunately, we got 0.60" of rain on the swathed hay Friday night. Randy had hoped it would be dry enough to bale over Father's Day weekend, but the additional rain fall curtailed that schedule.

He was able to bale a field of alfalfa hay Sunday evening.

 Yes, working on Father's Day made him happy.

On Monday afternoon, the oat hay was dry enough to begin baling.

The first round yielded 14 bales!

I got another "This is fun!" from my farmer ... until the baler slugged and he was pulling hay out by hand. He wasn't able to bale past dark, since the hay got too wet.

OTHER FARM UPDATES 

 

BUMPER CROP ... TURTLES

Wet weather is not good for hay baling. But it's good for turtles. This snapping turtle was visiting our driveway last week. That's quite a distance from a creek, but there are a plethora of mudholes to visit in the vicinity.

WHEAT

June 13, 2019

The rain and cool weather have slowed Wheat Harvest 2019. By this time in most recent years, our combines have been rolling through golden fields. Here's the breakdown:

2010:  June 18
2011:  June 10
2012:  May 26 (an anomaly and the earliest harvest, by far, we've ever had)
2013:  June 21
2014:  June 17
2015:  June 20
2016:  June 15
2017:  June 12
2018: June 12
2019: ???????????????

This year, there's still a lot of green. The weather map shows the chance for more rain this week. The weather is something we can't control. Last fall, because of 15 inches of rain, we couldn't even plant 400 acres of what Randy had planned for our 2019 wheat crop. So the strange weather continues.

When we were taking photos in the wheat field last week, it felt more like spring than mid-June. The hot winds that blow in harvest weather just haven't been around much. On the other hand, the cooler weather helped fill the heads.

Another field - June 16, 2019

The last several days have started to feel like harvest weather. However, there is rain in the forecast today. According to the National Weather Service, severe thunderstorms are "very likely," with the possibility for hail and high winds. Scattered thunderstorms remain possible for all areas from Thursday night through Sunday.

So, at this point, we'll just have to see what happens. (I guess that's always true!)

MILO

 

 The milo crop is up and growing.

I took this photo as Randy was planting milo on June 4 (a different field). He planted 95 total acres of milo and 25 acres of silage.

June 13, 2019

It's off to a good start.

CORN

June 13, 2019

The prevented planting of wheat acres meant an increase to those we are devoting to corn on the County Line this year. We planted 600 acres of corn in mid- to late April on ground that Randy had planned to go to wheat this year.

April 2019

We are planting more corn this year than ever - 600 acres. That's not much when compared to other farmers, especially those with irrigated acres, but it's significant for us.

Another 12+ inches of rain in May means a lot of mudholes in the corn fields. The cool weather in early June also slowed down the growth. But it's making progress.

It would be nice if we could "bank" some cooler days and a little rain for when the corn is tasseling.

ALSO IMPORTANT - A COOKIE UPDATE

I spent an afternoon replenishing my cookie supply for harvest. I tripled my go-to cookie recipe and then divided the dough, making it into five different varieties. I bag some of them two-by-two in snack-sized bags and stick them in the freezer. That makes it easy to pull out bags for meals-to-the-field treats. Randy has bales piled. I have cookies.

Prevented Planting: Wheat 2019

Sunset - October 25, 2018

This sunset sky photo is undeniably pretty.

But the reflection of that sunset sky in mud puddles reveals a big problem for us this fall. For the first time ever, we weren't able to plant almost one-third of our 2019 wheat crop - about 385 acres. This has never happened since Randy began planting wheat in 1974 as a senior in high school.

The ground was too wet to plant after 14-plus inches in October and 2.5 inches more in November, along with three snows.

To receive full crop insurance coverage on wheat, we needed to plant the 2019 wheat crop by October 31. That simply wasn't possible on low-lying areas. It was either under water or too muddy to drive a drill through. 

The sunset over the Zenith branch of the Kanza Co-op revealed another storm system on the way.

If we had been able to plant by November 15, we could have done so and received reduced insurance coverage. However, with the additional rain and snow, it wasn't possible.

We have elected to take a prevented planting option in our crop insurance policy. It will pay a percentage of our revenue guarantee. Part will be paid now and more could be paid later, if we don't collect crop insurance on the next crop.

The "other side" of the sunset, October 25, 2018

To qualify for prevented planting coverage, "the insurable cause of loss must be weather related and must be common to the area. The cause of loss must have prevented other producers in similar situations from planting the intended crop. ... The prevented planting acreage must have been planted and harvested at least once in the previous three years."

Next spring, we plan to plant dryland corn (and a little milo) on the acres we couldn't plant to wheat. The cost of planting corn is appreciably higher than the cost of planting wheat due to seed costs, fertilizer and herbicide. Because we are a totally dryland farm, wheat typically performs better than corn on our acreage. 

October 3, 2018

In addition to not being able to plant some acres, Randy also had to replant most of our seed wheat and some of our other fields, totaling about 300 acres. This was an additional expense with seed cost, labor, fuel and equipment usage.

At this point, none of the wheat looks very good. That's because of too much rain, not enough sunshine, poor germination and emergence.

We'll hope conditions improve before we truck our Harvest 2019 to Zenith next June!

October 29, 2018

Piercing the Worry

A glimpse of the morning sky had me grabbing my camera and taking off down the road for photos. The first stop was my sunrise tree, where the tapestry of sky almost made me ignore how much water is still in the fields. Almost. But there's still some water in the road, and the neighbor's mudhole reflected  a sliver of the morning sky.

As the sun creased the horizon, I hurried down the road to take some photos of the milo field we still need to cut. Those photos weren't all that memorable. I didn't like them with the flash any better.

But then I noticed a single jet stream creasing the sky like a bullet. Though you can't tell from the photo, the rising sun glinted off the underbelly of the jet plane. And I thought about the Plains' reputation as a flyover country. I wondered if those passengers were looking at the patchwork of water-logged fields below, watching the sunrise from their perch in the heavens, or whether they had their heads buried in a book or an in-flight movie or were still snoozing. 

But then I thought about all they were missing. I admit it. The last few weeks have been challenging. Thirteen inches of rain brought farming to a halt for three weeks during the busy time of fall harvest and wheat planting. Like the deep ruts that were left behind by flood waters coursing over dirt roads and through culverts and making rivets in fields, the rain gouged our hearts and minds with worry about getting everything done.

Then, last week, after only two days of trying to plant wheat again, we got another inch of rain, bringing our grand total to 14 inches. Randy got back onto the field again Monday to try and beat the October 31 deadline for planting wheat.

On a crisp fall morning, I tried to recognize how much I should be thankful for.

The other side of the sunrise brought morning's first light to a neighbor's mowed hunting trail.

It kissed the tops of hay bales in a CRP field just north of our house.

A week ago, I left just as the sun was rising to go to a meeting in Hutchinson. There was a thin layer of fog hanging in the air on this windless start to the day. I couldn't resist stopping to click a few photos. And, yes, I still made it on time to the meeting.

I have to admit that I've been in a fog of doubt the past few weeks. And, I'd be lying if I said those worries are gone. God doesn't like worrying, but I don't think He's a big fan of lying either.

But just like morning light penetrates fog, I know I have much to be thankful for. I look at the photos of destruction from Hurricane Michael and Hurricane Wilma. I still have a house. I still have power. I am still able to buy fuel or food without waiting in lines caused by a weather-induced shortage. I read Facebook updates from the wife of a young farmer who was critically injured while he was planting wheat last week, and I am thankful that we are just experiencing the aches of pains of our age, rather than mending from a terrible accident.

Am I happy that we'll be spending more money on certified seed wheat to replant seed wheat? No. But I can be happy that we're again able to be in the field planting ... even if Randy has to drive around some mudholes to get it done.

 And there is certainly enough beauty to appreciate.

During my morning walk, the geese call to each other and look like black pepper flakes floating on a soup bowl of bright blue.

That jet stream looks like a row of silver embroidery thread piercing through blue fabric.

And the shelterbelt to the north (the one that hides a secret fairyland ... and skunks) is dressed in its fall best.

All I have to do is open my eyes ... and my heart .. to hope. Maybe the worry can fall away like those autumn leaves. Well, I can pray that happens.

This photo was taken October 3, 2018. Wheat planting has been a marathon.

NOTE: We may not be able to plant 415 acres to wheat that were part of Randy's wheat plan for 2019. More on that in an upcoming blog post. We'll see how that all goes ...  since there are raindrops on the weatherman's map yet again.

Today is Randy's birthday. A blueberry pie is in his future!