It’s raining here, mostly in the hills and mountains around us.
The storms come up in the afternoon after a sweltering morning.
I really don’t mind the rain, or the clouds, but this time of year…moisture, coupled with heat, then sometimes it does produce hail. So everytime the storms come in we hold our breath hoping hail doesn’t also come with it.
Linda
The weatherman was right!
A thirty-mile-an-hour wind blew in yesterday afternoon (you are looking at field trash flinging itself all over the road, on the fences and into the next field) bringing with it a very bitter cold front.
This onion farmer was rolling the last of the field trying to push the tiny seeds down far enough into the ground the wind would not blow the seed away. Onion seeds are TINY. And they are only planted 3/4 of an inch into the ground. The roller packs and settles the soil on top of the seed protecting it.
The rain started around suppertime and stopped this morning.
Farmers in the area kept going until it just got too muddy.
Then they were done.
Some worked right up until they couldn’t drive their equipment off the field….every minute helps when you have way too much to do and way too little of a window to get it done in.
Terry and Misty didn’t work yesterday. Having worked until dark the day before getting all the ground rolled. Terry doesn’t like to ‘move soil’ when the wind is blowing. (Our top soil then goes “who-knows-where”). They will start leveling once everything dries out again.
On the bright side of this little storm we should start seeing green things popping up!
Now That is a wonderful thought!
Linda
It’s raining here….again!
The only farmers working are the sweet corn harvesters and the farmers/ranchers with ensilage or chop’n corn. These guys must think a big freeze is coming, because most times farmers don’t want to work in mud. But they have tractors pulling the trucks out when they get stuck. The other thing they don’t like is to have half thier field out on the highway or roadways.
We are stopped until it drys out. Pinto Beans Can Not be harvested in mud. Rain smashes the pod down into the ground so the combine isn’t able to pick up the vines and thrash out the beans.
So we wait.
I did see a patch of blue sky last night so hopfully by this weekend we can begin again.
Linda
Another huge down pour hit our area yesterday around 5:30 in the evening
The rain was coming in sideways with 50-60 mph wind
I was just finishing up my evening chores when it hit
The weather stations said something big was coming (again) and to prepare for flash floods.
They were so right! Of course we are on a mesa, but our neighbors in the canyon experienced the roar and thunder of a massive flash flood.
We haven’t pulled the beans yet, nor was the hay down, but still more water is just that more water.
Linda
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
We are soaked! Through and through.
Over night the rains leave and we wake up to chilly cool morning…nothing like August, nothing.
By 9 or 10 in the morning the humidity has built up it hard to even breathe, let alone work in it. Humidity like this is very unusual for our part of the world.
Around three or so in the afternoon it starts raining.
And raining.
And raining way into the night.
It is raining so much the water can’t dry up or sub away.
We don’t have any hay down, nor are we trying to harvest wheat, barley or rye, or the sweet corn. Some of the grains are harvested and some aren’t. Farming sure is a gamble with the weather and the prices.
The sweet corn guys have four-wheel drive on all their vehicles and keep on keeping on. Sweet corn has a very short window so if the vehicles get stuck they pull them out. The workers keep on working right in the rain. The only time they pull out is when a field is done or we have too much lightening.
Well, onto another day of rain. Wish I could send those of you who need some, some.
Linda
Fall is in the air and it’s not even the end of the first week of August.
It’s been raining here for weeks–we are heading in the the third week of rain.
The flies even seem to think a big freeze might be coming….they stick to us like we are the best thing since furnaces, ugh!
But with all this rain we get
Rainbows!
So I’m out all the time looking and looking to see what I can find in the sky
Two days in a row the sky was just right to see rainbows in the same place. Which I found really cool.
Last night on the way to feed I looked up through the leaves and WOW another one.
The rain is really good for everything, the corn and beans and hay and my yard are looking near perfect. And so are the weeds!
I’m not looking forward to winter, but for now I sure am enjoying the rainbows!
Linda
The rains came last night and cleared up the sky!
The world is all shiny and new again and Utah’s dirt is meshing with Colorado soil.
Still cold here, but with the wind and the dirt settled I’ll take cold.
Linda
Since it was raining on Sunday
We decided this was a good time to go visit Terry’s Mom and Sister and Brother-in-law
And maybe visit a John Deere dealer or two and go to a couple of farm sales
We have to travel over the Rocky Mountains to get to the eastern side of Colorado.
As we go the traffic picks up and up and up….UGH!
Signs warn us all along that the traffic into Denver is immense and to expect delays.
Boy, were they ever right! See the cars W.A.Y. back there. We kept along at 8 miles an hour until after the tunnel.
We made it. We got to have a nice evening with family and the next day took in some dealerships
And a retirement farm sale.
We got home late that night. I am really glad to be back home. I am NOT a city girl grandma.
If the weather holds we will begin tractor work Saturday!
Linda
It was a heavy quick storm, the moisture was nice. It was in town and not on the hay fields! 🙂
Life on a Colorado Farm 