Two days before the storm hit and winter came upon with a bam(!) Terry and I drove down to the canyon. Robidioux Canyon is just three miles from the farm and is one of the last “undeveloped” areas next to us.
It’s home to cattle, big horned sheep, deer and mountains lions.
There is something so primitive about it, that it calls to my soul. Here is a portion for you to enjoy.
Have a nice weekend!
Linda
On Thursday or Friday of this week our irrigation water will be turned off.
No longer will irrigation water from the Gunnison River flow through our canal on its way to California.
The canal will dry up and stay empty until next spring…the last week in March.
I am showing you pictures of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. 40 miles from our farm.
This is the canal that diverts the allotted portion of the Gunnison river into canals for irrigation and drinking water.
This canal is so large a grain truck can sit in the bottom of the canal and there is still several more feet to the top. Lots of water flows through here. Lots of water.
I actually like this incredibly dangerous and frightening water. I enjoy knowing the life that it brings to the land. And I like drinking it too 🙂
Linda
I drove to work today in a snow storm
Goodness! What we have gone from October right into December! And it’s cold too. Very cold. BRRRRRR.
But before the kids left for New York we had a really neat opportunity to get to visit with Daryl from Haf Doz’n Reasons (Kath on my side board)
as he traveled through.
Evan loved talking with Daryl as he used to drive truck and the grandchildren loved the truck!
They were very excited to see there was a bed AND a TV in the truck.
AND “It’s so big, Grammy! Watch me climb!”
Meeting blog friends is special to me. Getting to know each of you has been a real pleasure. You’all come by sometime, you’ll be welcome!
Linda
Here is the header in action….down go the stalks and in goes the corn
And of course things always have to have a down side. One of the back tires when flat.
Surprisingly the back tires are like the front tires of the car, they do all the moving of the combine. The BIG tires on front support everything. This always gets me confused, makes me feel like I’m backing up a trailer all the time.
But in the ‘spare’ combines was the perfect tire!
Last year one of the front ones went flat. It’s nice to have parts. (These tires cost bunches and bunches of money)
When field corn (as opposed to sweet corn or ensilage corn) is dry and ready for harvest it looks like this. The moisture in the corn needs to drop, meaning leave the cob, the stalks and leaves to a proper level so it won’t mold. We harvest (pick) corn around a 12 or 14. It’s 12 in this photo.
This is a deer run. You can see how they beat a path through the rows. They even make beds inside the corn, which show up on Google earth like circles.
This is the corn combine. We have another one to combine beans. Our equipment is old by most farmers’ standards, but it works for us and it’s paid for. We joke because DH has several combines, five to be exact, but two of them are for parts. When you have old equipment you need to have parts for when they break down…we live too far away from Tractor Salvage yards so we keep a small herd for repairs. 🙂
You can see the combine moving down the field. This combine takes four rows at a time.
This is a better view. Beacause of how DH plants the rows a four-row header works the best for us.
The combine strips all the corn off the cob and spits it out
And leaves the field looking like this! Later on in the year (the hay has to be totally dead or it will bloat the cows) we will turn the cows out to run the whole 80 acres. They love these cobs and stalks and the corn that gets spilled. It’s a favorite food to them.
The combine stores the corn until the HOPPER is full. Then DH dumps the corn into the back of our truck. I call this liquid gold.
We take all our corn to the Delta Elevator, but other people have contracts with Foster Farms.
Delta Elevator also sells some of our hay for us. We have customers that come to the farm, but the Elevator also contracts with us.
Here the corn is turned into feed for all types of corn eating animals.
Each load is weighed in before unloading. After unloading the truck is weighed again. This is how the farmer is paid. I’m not sure what the price is this year, it’s down from the last couple of years.
I would have gone in to take pictures of the corn sliding into the shoot, but they didn’t want me in there….something about safety.
And it starts all over again until the field is completely done for another year.
We are moving right along on the barn
In-between harvesting the corn and hauling hay-
And the bad weather
(Blade……Linkin….Tallen…2009)
We have the foundation in place!
The storm is leaving so DH is back in the corn field! We didn’t have rain!
YEAH!
We (meaning DH really) started combining corn late yesterday.
The moisture content is 12.
Now if the rain will just hold off …
Linki’s chickens have finally started laying eggs. She was SO excited to bring Grammy some of HER eggs.
They are Blue! Oh! My! Aren’t they just beautiful!
I took pictures of her eggs up against my Rhode Island Red eggs. (I have one hen who lays a small egg.)
It’s really fun to have grandchildren and more than delightful when they like the same things you do!
Today’s world has brought to us the riches of wonderful and thoughtful friends.
Far Side sent to me these darling photo cards as a thank you.
What a wonderful time we live in, when friends from around the globe can be made in the twinkle of an internet second through blogging.
Thanks you, Far Side! Your photography is beautiful; I will enjoy mailing these cards to friends and relatives near and far!
Life on a Colorado Farm 