Crop Report

Posted on August 22, 2011 by Dayphoto

Summer is fast coming to a close. It doesn’t seem possible that this is the last full week of August. School started here for everyone. The big busses passed our house early this morning (there are two). This afternoon my little grandchildren will get off the bus and walk down our lane until volleyball season ends. Misty is one of the volleyball coaches at the middle school so the two oldest grandchildren will ride the bus to our house. The littlest kid will already be here. 🙂

The pinto beans are starting to turn yellow and the bean pods have striped up, Terry should be pulling them in about two weeks if the weather stays warm.

The hay is getting close to the third cutting which should also hit in about two weeks (crops have thier own schedule…they don’t take yours into consideration 😉 )

And the corn has moved from the blister stage (where it is soft…if you stick your finger nail in one of the kernals it will pop) into hardening up. We raise hard-dent corn…. this is the corn you cook with to make corn bread or it is ground up and put into animal feed. Only about two maybe three more irrigations for the corn.

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We will still have to irrigate the hay to make sure it has a good healthy start into the winter, but our work is rapidly winding down.

The last week has brought moisture into our area…I only saw one rainbow, but it was wonderful….hitting the pinto bean field just about the time I was out picking corn! It was raining closer to the south side of Delta … we didn’t get wet. They got the rain, but I got to see the rainbow!

Linda

Prisoners Were Rescued on Day They were to be Executed

Mid-Summer When all the Earth Rejoices

Posted on August 7, 2011 by Dayphoto

Everything and every animal is looking rich and fat

The corn is filling out

Even though the heat has returned, I really don’t mind. I love spring, summer and fall. All parts of each season.

The rains have left for a spell, but just before they left a rainbow landed in the pinto bean field.

All is right with my world.

Have a wonderful Sunday, everyone!

Linda

Cold is the News

Posted on February 2, 2011 by Dayphoto

It is suppose to drop to -11 here tonight. Oh, well…guess we just have to travel through this cold to get to the other side of it. I think we are suppose to have somewhat warmer weather by the weekend.

Last time I looked the website said we have the potential to get all the way up to 31* on Saturday and 35* on Sunday. Pretty cold for me, but Terry is still going to the Annual Farm Consignment Auction. I asked him if it isn’t a wee bit too cold…he looked at me with horror in his eyes and flatly stated “all I have do is bundle up”. Okay, I get it. It’s never to cold for an auction.

Our neighbor is still trying to get his corn in. Most of the corn in the area is in, but a few guys are still hitting 15% or higher.

This sure has been an odd year for corn.

Okay, if you are over this way…guess we will see you at the auction on Saturday and Sunday. If not I’ll keep you posted on events.

Linda

The Year of the Wind

Posted on November 30, 2010 by Dayphoto

Wind became our constant companion starting this spring. Not just a now and then breeze but a real honest-to-goodness wind. After our really long, last forever and ever winter ended, the wind began.

Now wind is normal for our spring….it takes the wind to melt the snow in the mountains and in the canyons surrounding us, and because we live on a mesa, we are subject to wind.

Our wind comes out of Utah.

Five miles away in the town of Delta, while we are blowing away, they have nothing, nada, zip, no wind.

(I took this at 4:00 p.m. last evening)

But this year, after the spring winds left, the winds continued on into summer, then fall, and now winter 15-35 and sometimes 45-60 M.P.H. wing-dingers.

Even though the corn stalks, and the corn leaves, and the corn tassels are dry…the ears with their lovely little knurls are not.

The tops are now broken, lying helter-skelter along the furrows and there is nothing we can do but wait.

A warm up is suppose to start today and get all the way up to 45* by Friday with the nights bottoming out around 16*. But the best part is the wind is only going to be around 5 M.P.H.!

Say a little prayer for us that corn dries down to 14% or lower. Once that happens we can begin the harvest. A couple things rely on harvest…the cows are turned into pasture, which cuts down on the hay usage, and we get paid! One paycheck a year per crop is how a farmer gets to stay in business.

Sure has been a funny year. Terry said in all his years of farming, or his father farming corn, has the harvest ever been so late. We aren’t the only farmers hurting, so hopefully a corner has been turned and the corn can get out the fields into the elevators.

Linda

Through the Corn

Posted on August 19, 2010 by Dayphoto

I’m so busy at the moment I’m having a very hard time getting everything done. We are still having lots of rain. 60% today, 50% tonight, 40% tomorrow and so it goes. Everything is so wet we are not having to do lots of irrigation. Only the corn (it’s hard-dent corn, the kind perfect for corn meal or animal feed) and the alfalfa (if and when we can get it cut and baled and stacked) will need one more irrigation. Then we will be done for the year.

Boy, has this growing season ever zipped by!

Linda

The Corn is Looking Good

Posted on July 28, 2010 by Dayphoto

The corn is tasseling out and setting ears now.

This is when we start having trouble with the deer. They love to eat the silks off the corn. As most of you know the pollinating of the corn ear comes from the tassel which is at the top of the corn stalk. The pollen from the tassels falls all over the silk at the end of the corn husk (ear). Each little silk is a direct link to a kernel inside the husk.

If the deer eat the silk the husk dries up and dies. No corn. Not for us or anyone.

It’s hot here…running anywhere between 97-1004*. Humdity builds and builds and builds and then we get

a storm. Sometimes with rain, and sometimes with hail, but the hail has missed us so far.

We were taking Fuzzy down to the river for a swim, but the water is now gone. That’s one the things that happens to the Roubioux in August.

Linda

The Middle of Summer

Posted on July 3, 2010 by Dayphoto

Terry finished cultivating the corn and the pinto beans.

He likes to use the 730 because the clutch is a hand clutch and not a foot clutch.

There will be one more cultivation of the pinto beans, but the corn is too tall now. As soon as the bean shoot feelers all tractor work is done until harvest. The only thing left (on tractor work) is making alfalfa into hay.

Of course we will continute to irrigate, changing the water every 8 hours. Water is short, with reports that it could get shorter.

It’s hot. But we are having some moisture flowing in from Mexico after noon.

We cool down when it comes in which is really nice.

But we heat back up after the storm moves on.

That’s summer for you in our part of the high mountain desert!

Here’s how I cultivate! 🙂 This hoe never seems to leave my hand…I have it my yard, in the garden, and helping remove Canada Thistle, Star Thistle, Sticker Weed, Nodding Thistle, and other nasty stuff, which gets between the bean plants. Once the beans shoot feelers I won’t have to be out there, but until then….

Summer is lots of work, but I would rather have summer than winter. Terry, now, he would rather have cold, dark, dreary, drab winter. Oh, oops! I think those are my words.

The Fourth of July is tomorrow. (and then by Tuesday they should have the part to fix my internet receiver! YEA!)

Happy 4th, everyone!

Linda

Crops

Posted on May 18, 2010 by Dayphoto

The crops are starting to come along. Everything is really slow because of the cold weather. But finally the corn is poking through the ground in the middle field, and the east field’s seed is starting to soften and sprout. If the weather would warm up and stay warm (corn likes warm weather) the fields will green up nicely.

Terry is watering the bean ground, last set, and then it will dry for awhile before he plants. Here again we could use some warmer weather to dry out the subbed soil enough for planting.

I did get my garden planted this weekend, the garden rows share the same field as the pinto beans, I cut back some, instead of ½ of an acre I shrunk. It’s just too hard to keep everything going at my age and still work at a paying job!!! 🙂

The alfalfa is enjoying the cooler weather though. It won’t be long now before the first cutting, probably in about three weeks.

One thing about being out in the fields the views are amazing. On one side is the San Juan Mountains, the other view shows you the West Elk peaks, and in the north is Grand Mesa, the largest flat-top mountain in the world. But what butts up to our mesa is the Uncompahgre plateau.

Actually the Uncompahgre is more than a plateau it is a mountain range full of cliffs, canyons and mesas 90 miles long. When the sun is just right you can see this amazing geology so full of mystery and wonder.

Anyway, the wind has some good use, besides bringing the sap up in the trees and bushes. 🙂

As long as there is snow up there we will have wind.

Linda

Celebrating Corn

Posted on July 8, 2009 by Dayphoto

Our corn has grown amazingly well this year.

On June 30^th it was Linki size

Linki-is-Corn-High

then on the 4^th of July it was Bladen size,

Corn-is-Blade-High

and today it is showing signs of tasseling out.

Tasseling out is one of the most critical stages of corns’ development. What a farmer is aiming for is a large kernel number per ear on each stalk of corn. In other words a full ear of kernels! Most corn ears have about 12 to 16 rows of kernels, but if the conditions are just right you can sometimes have rows of upwards to 20! Now that is cool and helps with the tonnage at harvest.

Sea-of-Corn

I won’t go into tasseling and silking and pollination at this time. But suffice it to say, the corn is definitely ‘knee high by the 4^th of July’!

The Corn is Tally High

Posted on June 18, 2009 by Dayphoto

Tally-and-the-Corn-002

The corn is doing well; too tall now to cultivate. And the rain has stopped. Well, it has moved to the mountains surrounding us, we are only experiencing heavy afternoon winds. Lots of sun!

Life is good.