The odds are if you come to visit Scott Farms on a given day you won’t find us cutting corners at work. But sometimes we make an exception.
Corn grows tall. Tall enough that it can cause trouble at intersections on roadways. So we and many of our neighbors go around about this time of year and cut a few rows down right above the ear so drivers can see safely around corners. The worst intersection I have to deal with is actually the driveway leaving our barn lot. We have nice, tall corn growing on both sides of the lot, and it’s getting hard to know when to pull out into the road. A good problem to have I guess. I’d rather see a few hacked up corn plants than a couple of wrecked cars though.
As you pull up to the stop sign this corn blocks your view of oncoming traffic, and it’s not particularly tall.
No we’ve cut a few rows in down to the ear. This improves the view drivers have and leaves the ears intact for harvest.
This is the tool of choice. Strike a corn stalk just right and the blade slices right through it!
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Oh man that is a dangerous intersections if you’re in a combine. If you were growing corn feed, it grows even higher if I remember right.
That’s quite the sickle! Aren’t you glad we’ve progressed past using that instrument for the whole field?
I can hardly imagine farming with a tractor that has no cab let alone harvesting by hand!
My partner Harold’s dad used to cut the family’s wheat harvest by hand with a scythe and cradle, the kids used to follow and put it up in shocks and then they had threshing parties with the neighbors when the steam engine and thresher would come through. Periodically they’d haul wheat to town (horse and wagon) and the mill would take a portion of it as payment. The “good old days” during the Great Depression in rural Missouri.
I cut hay with a scythe for my animals, but I only have about an acre or a bit more to harvest.
Great story, Joanne.