Wheat Cleaning

A good day's work getting the wheat hauled to the cleaning plant. Still a month to go til it goes in the ground but its good to know the job is done. Weather was nice and the ground mostly dry. The one stretch of mud was not a big problem and won't be a big deal to smooth out with the blade once it dries out some.

The new residents of the hundred acre woods came out to watch me work. The bison herd has been there a bit over a week and seem to be enjoying their new home. They are the first livestock on that farm since my uncle went out of cattle over 20 years ago.

Tough Grain In The Bin

Yes, I have some tough wheat in the bin now. I made an "executive decision" yesterday afternoon to combine wheat. For those not familiar with the term "tough", it refers to the moisture content of the grain. Wheat is considered dry at 14.5% moisture. Anything above that level and we will receive a discount on the already low selling price. Plus the grain is at risk of spoilage.  But when the days grow short as we reach September and heavy rain is in the forecast, sometimes we have to gamble. At least the cold temperatures were in my favor as cold grain stores safer than hot.
With the cloudy cold and still damp morning I had been prepared to leave the combine in the shed but when the sun came out about noon it inspired me to head out with the combine and try a sample. It went well but I could tell the moisture content was up just by the way the grain piled in the hopper. Short trip home for a moisture test confirmed my suspicions. 17.1% moisture. Still, after two days of inactivity from the last rain I wasn't going to give up that 4 remaining hours of sunshine and wind knowing what tomorrow's forecast held (rain). Every rain fall robs us of quality, weight and price at this stage of the game. A quick change over of the grain auger to the aeration bin so I can blow a little air through the tough grain and I was rolling again. My ever faithful truck driver showed shortly to take the grain away and I commenced serious harvesting. Slow going in the heavy, lodged crop areas and the old 466 was surging up and down in rpm as heavy slugs of straw hit the rotor. Carefully avoiding flooded areas with only a few scary incidents of wheel slip I was able to work well after sundown. In fact I had serious hopes of finishing the field if I could stay awake til midnight (or more). Optimism and hope were dashed though as I rolled up to the truck to unload and heavy mist hit the windshield about 10:30.  
It varies from one region to the next and hard to find an up to date online harvest progress report but the last I heard Sask. is well behind normal progress for this date. Somewhere in the 50% complete range. Good to hear. I am about 51% done.

It Might As Well Be Spring

Yes, its the name of  an old tune but the past few days have me believing that spring has arrived. Throw off the parka, toque and winter mitts. For part of the day anyway. Lately the lazy farmer is making me look lazy. Although I made up for it yesterday. The cleaning plant was ready to do my wheat so I had to really hustle with the old Loadstar to keep up with the cleaner. It does 280 bushels per hour and I can only haul , well, less than that. It is a ten mile drive to the plant and hard to get much speed out of the old IH truck when it loaded with heavy wheat. I kept it down to 300 bushels per trip. Time lost moving grain augers, shoveling up the last few bushels out of the bin, moving five miles to another location for the last load. It all adds up to a lot more time than I can believe. At the end of the day with close to 900 bushels of clean wheat in the bin, over 150 miles on the truck, screenings hauled to another bin, engine oil drained from the truck (it was overdue for a change) and a headache, I was glad the day was done. One more small step in getting ready for the busy season.

Loading the Loadstar in the Hundred Acre Woods

At least the weather co-operated with beautiful sunshine and above normal temperatures. Making the snow really disappear. More forecast for tonight though as the descending temperatures turn the slow rain to snow. This too shall pass.
On the Massey tractor continuing saga, no big news. Small steps forward combined with setbacks mean the tractor still sits in the shed where I parked it last October. The engine head is on and running but the fuel tank installation did not go well. A previous owner had damaged the threads on the tank outlet and I made it even worse. I don't know if teflon tape and JB weld are going to be enough to fix this one. Agco parts tell me that a new one is not available anywhere at any price.
Stay tuned, I have not given up on this one yet.

Small Victories

I think that is the name of a song or something but it seemed appropriate for today. This calf in the picture is (I think) going to be a success story for today. Last night I figured it didn't have much hope after struggling for an hour to get some milk replacer into it (with no success). It had plenty of strength to fight and no interest in drinking milk.  I couldn't leave it outdoors with the cow as heavy snow was predicted. It stood a better chance in the shelter, even with an empty stomach. The cow showed no interest in joining it in the pen so they spent the night on opposite sides of a corral panel fence.
This morning the cow was right there calling loudly for her calf and the calf was up and showing interest in her. A pail of chop and some hay enticed her into the pen although its always a bit of a struggle to keep the wrong cows from crowding in with her. That calf didn't take long to find out where his breakfast came from and soon everybody was happy. Another night indoors is in order since although the storm is over, the temp has dropped to 0F and I don't want her taking the calf away to spend the night in a snowbank.

On the mechanical side it seems there is hope of keeping my 42 year old International truck on the road. The brake shop has located some supposedly good used front brake drums, relined the worn out shoes and with a little luck I should get the new wheel cylinders on in the next few days too.
Nice to hear the price of oats has risen to near $3.90 a bushel. This would be even better news if I hadn't sold a good portion of mine for $3.75 last week but I'm not complaining. This grain marketing is always a gamble.

Moving Canola July 11.

Heres a little video of what I did yesterday. Known in the industry as "turning grain", I moved some of last years canola from several smaller bins into a bigger hopper bin. It was a good day for it although I made some mistakes with the camera taking interesting pictures of the ground as I walked instead of what I intended. The canola dust bothered me a little but not nearly as much as the grass pollen did today as I sat out in the mosquito-ridden hell that is Saskatchewan outdoors this summer.
The open station IH swather offers no protection from the weather , bugs or grass pollen. I used to laugh at people who talked about "hay fever" until the past few years when I have become much more intolerant of grass pollen.
Its like a bad head cold. Between the sneezing , runny nose, itching eyes and wrists (that could have been mosquito bites) I was about at the limit of my endurance.
This swather does not do well in certain types of grass. The knife builds up with material and begins to hammer out a warning that , if not heeded, could lead to expensive destruction of the knife drive gearbox. Slow down! Although at times I was hardly moving at all. A sitting duck for the hungry mosquitos. It was a good windy day that would normally keep the mosquitos and pollen dispersed and offer some relief. Unfortunately there is so much bush on Nevardland where I was cutting that a lot of the time I hardly knew the wind was blowing.
By 7:30 I had enough and drove up onto the transporter to enter the welcome confines of the cab of the Case tractor and drive home in relative comfort.
There is quite a bit more hay I could cut there but I've already cut more than enough to keep my small herd fed for the winter so I will not be in a hurry to go back and cut the rest.
Easterly winds blowing and clouds in the west hint at rain in the near future. Not a good thing for drying hay but I can't control the weather.