It’s that time of year….

(Third cutting of alfalfa)

When all of spring and summer come together

Third cutting of hay is cut and drying…Terry is raking and turning the rows even as I type away.

Soon, very soon…maybe tomorrow or the next day…it all depends on the weather, he will pull the pinto beans.

The corn has passed the blister stage, moving into the dough. After that it will be ready to ‘dry down’.

We are on the last little bits of irrigation.  No more changing water on the pinto beans, only one more good soaking of the alfalfa, after the last bale has been hauled and stacked (possibly two if the fall is terribly dry—alfalfa can’t go into the winter dry or the crop will die.)

All that is left is watering the corn, by the end of September (in 30 days, maybe a few more, but not many-maybe even less) the irrigation water will be turned off to our farm.

We will be done.

After that we wait…until the last of October or the first of November when the harvest of the field corn begins.  Those that have ensilage or chopp’n corn, or silage (it’s all one in the same) will start filling the silos this week.

The stretch for harvest has begun!

Then winter’s silence will descend.

But not for awhile.

Not for awhile.

Not just yet.

The gift of the spring and summer’s work will be collected.  The work is has begun!

We will stretch ourselves thin, eat on the run, get up before dawn and settle back down way after dusk.  It will look easy to those driving by—people who have moved to the country to get away from the crowds.

I suppose it is, after all these years…it’s because we practice all the time. The continuing education credits come when this year’s paycheck comes in.  (We are paid once a year for pinto beans and corn.  The hay brings in small checks as the bales are sold.)

Harvest!  It is what we work for— the accumulation of the year.

Your friend on a farm in Western Colorado,

Linda