It’s been another busy week all about harvest on the farm. After a few hours of waxy corn harvest we started into popcorn and have been working on it all week long.
River View
So this is probably one of the best pictures I’ve taken in a while. This was taken while standing on the combine while waiting for the grain cart to come unload me. This field along the Wabash River is surrounded by trees. The sunset filtering through the clouds and the dust of harvest made for a great picture don’t you think?
The field in the picture is the long crescent shape. The trees between here and the fields to the West constitute a 100′ change in elevation making the river bottom field quite isolated.
The river bottom can be a battle to harvest. One problem is what we call pickle vines, but many know this weed as bur cucumber. We knew we had this weed in the bottoms so we had a helicopter come in to spray. It’s tough to get a good kill on them because of the heavy crop canopy late in the season. Frankly there isn’t much room for flying and a normal sprayer would knock over a lot of corn late in the season. However, the vines were hurt enough that almost all of them didn’t cause me any trouble. They weren’t dry and brittle, but they weren’t strong enough to hold together as the combine passed. And when they did plug me up they weren’t quite so mature that they had spikes all over to fill the fabric of my gloves. Two years ago I had to leave half an acre of popcorn in the field because it just couldn’t be harvested due to the thickness of the vines.
As the sun sets and the dust rolls there is a certain part of the day when vision is limited. This video shows what I saw during my second to last pass through the bottoms. I chose to go South on this pass so I could finish headed North. I chose wisely considering this way my view. Auto steer really helps when you can’t see!
I say chose wisely because I did not see this fallen tree at all through the sun and dust. I had the outside row plug on the corn head and I only new because I heard the chatter of the slip clutch. Had I taken the outside pass headed into the sun I would have hit the tree square. The other reason I wanted to head the other along the outside is so my auger would be on the open side of the field. With the auger away from the trees I’m less likely to get myself in trouble when I inevitably will need to stop and back up. This was one of five fallen trees I encountered.
The battle of the river bottom ended late one night when Dad arrived for the final truckload. For some reason he encountered a stopped train on his way back to the field from the popcorn plant which is 2 hours away. The train set him back another couple of hours.
Popcorn Party
When we start popcorn harvest (or soybeans for seed) we need to thoroughly clean out the combine, trailers, and grain cart before we get started. It’s imperative that we deliver a pure product, and don’t run the risk of having a load rejected at the plant for having other crop seed present. Last I checked you’re allowed a total of five field corn kernels in a load of popcorn, and that is up from the three they used to allow. When we enter the first popcorn field I’ll extend the unloading auger and run it for a few seconds while harvesting just be sure the grain tank is clean of anything we couldn’t blow out. Better to have a few pounds of popcorn on the ground than something else in the truck.
This is the first load of 2013 popcorn loaded in the evening and ready to hit the road first thing the next morning.
Filling up a truck with tasty popcorn!
Popcorn harvest is getting the combine pretty dirty!
The New Guy
That brand new tractor? It got a tank of fuel and hitched up to the vertical till when it came home and that’s all it has done so far. Just hanging out in the shed with 3.5 engine hours on the clock.
Super Truck
I’ve called my 2004 266,000 mile Duramax Chevy by the name Super Truck for a while now. But I got a shiny new truck with 4,000 miles on it remember? Yep. It won’t start without a help from a booster. Super Truck came back to work for a couple of days. I’ve also seen trucks called Truck Norris. I like that.
Hydraulic Hijinks
This is how the hydraulic and electric controls for the combine heads attach to the combine. The combine has a plate like this and they latch together. The latch also engages pins that secure the head to the machine. The two hydraulic hook ups should look the same but you can see the bottom one has the center section pushed in. Part of a seal is poking out as well. I picked up a seal kit, but the fitting was not coming apart like the instructions showed. I didn’t really have the right tools and didn’t want to drop the inner springs in the field where I would never find them again. Since everything had been working fine I just plugged the thing back in and decided to fix it back at the shop or wait until it really fails.
Farm Boys
Me, my son’s friend, and my son enjoying popcorn harvest.
Comments or questions about our week? Leave ’em below!
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Great pictures…thanks for sharing!
I really love your pictorials. So cool.
I loved your popcorn harvest blog post.
Thanks. We finished popcorn harvest today.
Was it Norfolk Southern that slowed you dad down?They run between Delphi & Logansport?Your 9670 needs a bath.Have seen so many 8360Rs this year it seems like every John Deere has it least one.Notice Howard & Sons is asking right around $145 large for you 7920.When was the last time you field near THe Wabash River got flooded.225 east of Battleground is vulnerable to flooding.The land near a river should be the best to grow corn on
Not sure what train it was. That field was under about 3′ of water in early April this year.