Our first full week post-harvest has passed on the farm. This is about the time of year people start wondering just what it is farmers do in the winter. Keep up with my Farm Week in Pictures series throughout the winter to see what keeps us occupied in the coming months.
Cleanup Time
The time has come to begin cleaning up all the harvest equipment. First on the list was the draper. It actually doesn’t get all that dirty so this was an easy one. We always like to blow as much dry stuff as we can with the air compressor before getting it wet with the power washer. One item down, and more to go.
We got a full season of good cutting out of the cutter bar on the draper. Actually the draper has two bars that throw back and forth from either end of the head with an overlap in the middle. A conventional grain platform has one bar spanning the whole width of the head. We pulled them out and will be putting all new, sharp sections in place so everything will be ready to rock around Fourth of July 2015 when the wheat is ready to harvest.
Grandpa usually takes on this job. That’s who you see in the picture. An air ratchet will make short work of this job.
The Drain Game
Our drainage project began this week. To keep the proper grader we had to start deep in the open ditch bank. Keep up for lots more pictures as this project progresses. We’ve been getting serious about drainage the last couple of years, and we think it’s paying off. The field we have pattern tiled over the last two falls showed its worth during a wet harvest season.
Post-Harvest Precision
Yield maps recorded during harvest flew by Wi-FI from the office laptop to my iPad. I also submitted my harvest report to our crop insurance agent.
Dad and I actually spent a lot of time in the office during the week. We got started on a little bit of tax paperwork. There will be plenty more of that along with updating our bank statements as the end of the year approaches. Yeah. Farming isn’t all big, green toys, quadcopters, and GoPro cameras. There’s a lot of behind the scenes business to make all that fun stuff happen.
Remember to keep up during the winter to see what we do, and be sure to comment with your thoughts.
Definitely a lot more goes on behind the scene than people realise for farming. Loving your weekly updates and photos. Look forward to seeing how your winter progresses. Lynda from Australia