Coop's Corner: Harvest

Saturday, November 2, 2013

Harvest - The Corn

My earlier Harvest Post this year had to do with our cherry trees and that was back in July. Yield per acre may have been on par with our corn, I don't know. I do know that our now much reduced (from the former 75) area of 12 acres of corn produces a lot more total bushels than our two cherry trees did and those acres were harvested faster than I was able to glean the cherries from the trees. Trucks were not required to carry our cherries "to the bin".

Today was the 2013 corn harvest and it was as exciting this year as it has always been for me. Lucky for me it happened on the weekend and during the daylight when I was actually able to see it all happening. I used to be a much more involved participant with the fall corn harvest, both for farmers I worked for as well as for the farms in our family. Now I only watch......and photograph the action while others get to do all of the fun stuff. I sorely miss being more directly involved however; being outside around the equipment, watching the bins getting full and experiencing the temperature and weather extremes all contribute even now to making the fall harvest the most special time for me.

This is the only hard maple on our acreage and it's in our yard. In a matter of 20 minutes the distant standing corn will all be gone.

The cropland on our 20 acres is split almost in half by our famous dry run ditch that serves as a drain for the valley. All of these photos are on the house side of the ditch. The 12-row corn head has to be disconnected and moved separately from the combine itself due to the width. A later photo will confirm, videos at the end.

Breaking open the first outside 12 rows.

The grain buggy tagging along behind the combine (and dust cloud) to be ready for the first hopper dump.

12 rows cut quite a wide swath in behind the barn. This pattern repeats; rows 4 and 5, then 8 and 9 get smashed down from the combine wheels, the other rows remain standing at a height slightly below where the ear grows on the stalk.

Up the valley.....

The 'business' side of the grain buggy. The hydraulic ram pivots the spout out for unloading. I'm not all that much taller than these tires.

Ready to take another bite......

One that got away and there aren't very many.......our over abundant population of deer won't let this go to waste.

The trailer dedicated to carrying the wide corn head.

Just on the other side of the harvested corn are many acres of prairie grass, some private, some belonging to the State Park. Beyond the trees is Lake Pepin, the wide spot in the Mississippi River and the shear bluff faces are neighboring Wisconsin.

The last of it on the house side of the dry ditch.....

Dumping into the buggy is an intermediate step.

Filling the truck.....

Dropping the head onto the trailer, a nuisance to move 100 yards to the other side of the ditch.

The 'headless' drive to the other side.....

and reconnecting......

They used to arrive with 18 wheel tractor/trailer rigs when we had 75 acres of tillable land. Now the straight trucks can handle the harvest.

And finally over across the ditch (the grassy green), the other, less oddly shaped 6 acres. 12 acres soon done, home in time for dinner with a late afternoon start, even with the hook-up issues due to the nuisance ditch crossing.

And the action shots....

13 comments:

VStar LadyNovember 2, 2013 at 8:28 PM
Oh how the harvest and the machines have changed over the years.
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RichardMNovember 2, 2013 at 9:03 PM
Cool! So at this point, the corn is dry? The fields look pretty brown…
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SonjaMNovember 2, 2013 at 11:10 PM
It's about high time for bringing the corn in as well in the Black Forest. The machines they using over here are smaller, I am thinking partly because otherwise you wouldn't be able to maneuver them over the smaller roads we have here.
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TrobairitzNovember 3, 2013 at 10:18 AM
Wow, that is a lot of corn. Is it for people, or animal feed, or re-seeding? I didn't realize some corn was harvested so late. I've never seen anything but the ears being picked.

Thanks for all the pics and video clips too.
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Keith - Circle BlueNovember 4, 2013 at 6:19 AM
". . . being outside around the equipment, watching the bins getting full and experiencing the temperature and weather extremes all contribute even now to making the fall harvest the most special time for me." Yep. I'm convinced experiencing the temperature and weather extremes is a big part of what I enjoy about riding. It's really hard to explain that. Either one gets it or one doesn't.

Yes, big change in equipment. We took corn out with a two row corn picker back in the day and stored the ears in corn cribs. Long ago, now.

What's up with the ditch? Any improvements in the works and do we have more adventures to look forward to?
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Coop a.k.a. CoopdwayNovember 4, 2013 at 8:29 PM
Hey Keith, you're right about the weather and 'getting it'. There was a mid-November day and I was out plowing, trying to get a field finished on a G900 Moline, no cab. It had started to snow slightly, it was already too late to get home for the 10PM News. The heat coming back from the motor and up from the warm transmission was keeping me warm and my eyeglasses clear. A few more rounds, then a couple of passes to clean up the dead furrow and the 3 mile trip home at a safe, casual pace in road gear on roads that were getting greasy. I finished, beating something that wasn't really a contest and the sense of magical satisfaction that I felt that night will stick with me always.

No real change with the ditch, other than a new(er) big tool to deal with the snow this winter. After last year's flood, part of the top layer of slab washed away. I repaired that, patched it really and our fingers are crossed. Snow predicted tomorrow night and now I need to get the snow fence up.
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Others say....

"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)