Thread: 2017 Fall Harvest

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I know some of you like to see pics from harvest so I decided to start a thread about this year's. It has been a weird one. This was one of the driest summers on records and the crops actually fared really well. The beans were really close to being bad though. Another week or 2 and the pods would have been falling off. This is the strangest year because the stems of the plants were still green. Beans would be at 13% and the stems still green. Corn at 17% and stalks still green and hard to cut. Totally nuts for the conditions. They've had some corn fields yielding 320 bushels/acre. Many 280's, and that makes it hard for the semis to keep up with them running 2 combines.

They should be finished up this week. They only have about 400 acres of corn left. Then the rush to get anhydrous put on before the ground freezes. They might be doing that in the spring though.

More and more to come.

This year I was able to take the kids each at least 1 time. Well, all except baby Ivvy. All of the kids got to ride in the grain cart tractor and combine as well. They love it. The first pic is Izzy standing by the truck while we were letting it warm up and doing a walk around. Pic 2 is her excited and ready to go. Pic 3 is a John Deere A with a 2 row picker out picking ear corn. This was really cool because she loves "her green tractor", which is an A. I stopped in a parking lot on the return trip so she could watch it and listen to it. Now I have to get ours running again because she wants a ride before it snows. Haha The last pic is of a coop employee that always forgets the triple axle trailers hold more. He did it several times that day.

One of the fields was so long, and it had a creek that divided it. We started it on a Friday and Saturday mid morning we moved to the other side. I was headed to town when they moved the combines. I drove my truck the nw route to the other side of the field. When I took my first load to town I got to this bridge with that 25 ton sign. It freaked me out but I went across anyway. I figured here goes nothing. The sign had to be wrong. The road to the north we were on has 2 bridges and both of those had no weight signage, and were way sketchier. But that sign had me freaked out none the less. Haha

The last pic is of a 4850 I saw coming and going to the New Sharon Coop one Saturday. My friends had one on their dairy farm I ran a lot and ever since I've wanted one. My big plans were to get one and stick a snow blower on it. I put many hours of a 4850 chopping corn, pulling a disc, wagon, or who knows what else. :LOL:

Some of during unloading the front hopper. Last pic is our kids this Halloween. My daughters were a deer and a duck. The boys were hunters. It was cold and really windy this year. They were all determined and frozen but they wouldn't stop.

Last Saturday morning we had to haul dry corn in to town to make room for wet corn they'd be picking that afternoon that had to come back to the farm to be dried. (They've already hauled over 150 loads of dry corn to town to make room in their bins. The drier shows they dried 321,000 bushels as of Saturday night through their drier. Pretty far above most normal years) My last dry load to town got me some shaking fingers at the scale house..... It was a long day. I put over 300 miles on the truck I was driving. There weren't too many dull moments. That was the field doing 280 average. We started with 4 semis running and were hauling in to the nearest town. 1 had to go back to the farm and haul more dry corn in. (They also had a tractor and 2 744 bushel wagons going to town with dry corn too.) Once they got into the more wet stuff, that all had to go to the farm. Then 4 semis couldn't keep up. When the equipment in the field has to stop, no one seems to be happy.

Originally Posted by 40FordDeluxe

When I took my first load to town I got to this bridge with that 25 ton sign. It freaked me out but I went across anyway. I figured here goes nothing. The sign had to be wrong. The road to the north we were on has 2 bridges and both of those had no weight signage, and were way sketchier. But that sign had me freaked out none the less. Haha

Safety factors back in the day were about 2 on reinforced concrete bridges, which may or may not be right for THAT bridge. However, you proved that it was at least 32 tons, so there's that.

When I got back I went and asked my friend about it. He said those signs are just suggestions. I laughed because if he smiled any wider his ears would have fell in. They've been farming there for years so I guess if they thought there was an issue they wouldn't have us go over those sketchy areas. Well, that's what I told myself as I was crossing it. Haha

I grew up on a farm so I really like these pics. Some really big equipment
there and expensive too. Friend of mine is running 6000 acres which is mostly
leased and raising corn, beans, wheat and tobacco, and there are others in our
county running more acreage.
Farming has come along way over the years when you look at those yields. Keep
those pics coming, and thanks for posting them.

Thanks for the pictures and descriptions, Ryan, that's some interesting stuff.

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I kind of miss being back there this time of year. I love to see the big harvesters go thru the fields. Those yields are staggering to me, back when I was a kid (50 years ago) if you hit a 100 bushels an acre it was great and 120 was phenomenal.



.

As always Ryan, Thank You for making time for us here.

The daughter pics are way cool, so glad you get to spend some time with the kids even if you're working. They'll never forget those times.

Over here when we're loading the cranberries, most of the truck drivers don't mind when we "crown" the load. We try to not put so much in that it'll spill over the sides as they go down the road but of course pack in as much as possible. And since the fruit is pumped up to the truck ( as we water pick) if the cops want to pull the truck over to scale it, the one thing the trucks don't do is stop! They make the police tail'em to the processing plant, simply because the whole time they're driving the truck is still draining! It's actually getting lighter the longer the drive. 8-) We're pretty close to the processer so we have loads that scale at 104, 105K... The newer drivers freak out as they haven't pulled loads that big, and haven't learned that they can't stop. The brakes become marginal and they have to be careful they don't sink the truck at the field! We've actually prepared loading areas and simple roads to carry the weight because we had one sink and to get it out we dumped the load on the ground 8-(

Originally Posted by rdobbs

I grew up on a farm so I really like these pics. Some really big equipment
there and expensive too. Friend of mine is running 6000 acres which is mostly
leased and raising corn, beans, wheat and tobacco, and there are others in our
county running more acreage.
Farming has come along way over the years when you look at those yields. Keep
those pics coming, and thanks for posting them.

Yes sir. There's s o much money setting in the fields in these pics, it is crazy. The cheapest things are their brand new triple axle trailers. They were only $50k. Each quad track is around $450k to buy new. I'm sure a combine is $480-$500k. They upgraded planters this past spring. It was $24k to buy it and they spent another $75k putting all new electric drives, loading and holding tanks, etc. Just mind boggling. They've got 1 combine that is getting enough time on it that they need to trade it in but they'd rather keep it. Problem is they can't get it in the shop to redo it in the winter. It's a double edged sword. They cash rent most of their ground. I think this year they did 4500. They lost some this year and have worked deals on other to replace it. The bad part is they have to do major work to some of it to be able to farm it this spring. They do all their own tile work and that is a complete other type of hassles.

Originally Posted by 34_40

As always Ryan, Thank You for making time for us here.

The daughter pics are way cool, so glad you get to spend some time with the kids even if you're working. They'll never forget those times.

Over here when we're loading the cranberries, most of the truck drivers don't mind when we "crown" the load. We try to not put so much in that it'll spill over the sides as they go down the road but of course pack in as much as possible. And since the fruit is pumped up to the truck ( as we water pick) if the cops want to pull the truck over to scale it, the one thing the trucks don't do is stop! They make the police tail'em to the processing plant, simply because the whole time they're driving the truck is still draining! It's actually getting lighter the longer the drive. 8-) We're pretty close to the processer so we have loads that scale at 104, 105K... The newer drivers freak out as they haven't pulled loads that big, and haven't learned that they can't stop. The brakes become marginal and they have to be careful they don't sink the truck at the field! We've actually prepared loading areas and simple roads to carry the weight because we had one sink and to get it out we dumped the load on the ground 8-(

No problem Mike. Yeah, I'm sure those 104k+ loads are very different to haul. Especially with water being involved. It's bad enough getting out of wet fields with 90=95k if you've never done it. Then with added axles, there is another learning curve. Here, I'm the trailer, this is where you're really going to go. Starting out at the bottom of big hills and turning onto big hills gets sketchy too. Especially with really dry corn. You'll exercise the pucker factor a bit.

Ryan, Always makes me laugh thinking if you won the lottery in excess of 100 million you could spend it all and start a farm! How far we have come since we all had a few pigs & cows,where did all those poor farmers go??? Love the pics, and look forward to seeing them. Best of Luck