Wheat Planting on the Prairie

Wheat Planting Time on the Prairie

Mid-September to the first of October is the ideal time to plant wheat here on the prairie. Wheat was always the primary crop that we planted on our farm when we were farming full time. The farmers work all year to raise that crop as that is your main source of income for the year. It is vital to the success of the farm, family and finances. Because of these dynamics it can be a very stressful time of year. Much work must be accomplished on the farm to care for the crops and the animals with the winter months fast approaching. We usually carried over a truck load of wheat from last July’s harvest so that it could be used to plant or drill the new crop of wheat. This seed wheat needs to be cleaned to remove trash and make it as clean as possible to plant.

John 12:24 Truly, truly, I say to you unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

One year the land we were planting wheat on had not been prepared as properly as the Farmer liked it to be. Some of the weeds on one piece of ground had grown too big and we couldn’t get the ground worked with the tractor and sweep machine as much as we liked. So we decided to drill the wheat while we still had some moisture and began the process. The Bride is the Farmer’s only hired man as the sons and daughter were in school.

The Farmer’s plan was that the Bride would help to load the drill with seed wheat with 5 gallon buckets as he was down in his back and couldn’t do all that he wanted to do. This process went along pretty well. It was during the next step that the problems began to appear. The Farmer drove the tractor while the Bride rode on the drill to make sure we could get through the weeds and that the seeds were going into the ground as they should. Because we know from the scripture above, unless the wheat falls into the ground and dies it does not produce and we needed much fruit!

This plan, although a good one did not work well as the Bride got over whelmed with her duties and fell quite behind. The Farmer always has a good plan B ready and we changed spots. The Bride drove the tractor while the Farmer rode on the drill. This was better but the Bride was very concerned that she would knock her precious Farmer off of the drill with her antics as the driver. Also the tractor is very noisy and it makes it extremely hard to hear the Farmer and his instructions. The Bride has never understood Farmer sign language. She did however understand that she was to stop the tractor when the Farmer began to hit the drill with a crow bar with great force. He said he was not angry he was just trying to get the Bride’s attention to STOP the tractor.

Life is like a field, where we must gather what we grow, weed or wheat…this is the law, we reap the crop we sow. – Patience Strong.

Needless to say, it was a long day and there were some marriage issues that arose BUT the wheat did finally get drilled and a very tired Farmer and Bride got home to a nice warm shower after a strenuous day in the dirt.

Keep on Truckin’

The first of August the Farmer got a call from a neighbor needing someone to haul some corn out of his bins to the ethanol plant. The Farmer answered that call and has hauled 50 some semi loads of corn to the plant. Due to some truck issues and some contract issues with the plant he just finished this project the end of September.

Western Plains Energy is the plant twenty miles from our farm. I took this information from their website. It was started in 2004 to improve the value of local grain. This company has become a leader in the ethanol industry and has enjoyed many successes along the way. Today this plant produces approximately 50,000,000 gallons of denatured ethanol annually. The products from this plant are put to use in the very best way. A way that feeds and fuels. The grain brought into this ethanol plant is transformed into livestock feed in the form of distiller’s grain and into high-octane fuel in the form of ethanol.

Many local farmer’s sell their grain to Western Plains Energy. The Farmer got on a first name basis with some of the scale helpers over there.

“Have you ever noticed that anyone driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone driving faster than you is a maniac?”

-George Carlin

Truck driving is addictive. There was a time years ago when the farmer did some longer hauls with a semi, that I thought he might love truck driving more than his bride. But I was wrong. He was able to break free for his family. So now it’s just kind of fun for him to hit the road again on a short haul and run that truck through the gears.

“Find solace in the symphony of the engine and tires on the open road.”

Farming in Maine

“You know farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil and you’re a thousand miles from the cornfield.” Dwight D. Eisenhower

The farmer and I always enjoy checking out the agriculture whereever we are. Farmland and its use is precious to us. I guess you can send a farmer on a trip but you never get the farm out of his heart. We’ve seen every kind of tree imaginable here and on the way here. As we drive the highways we have often commented on the scenery. “You’ve seen one tree, you’ve seen them all!” 🙂 You can tell we come from the wide open prairie!

On our adventures we stopped at one of those dome houses that was painted blue and was called blueberry world. We felt this was one of God’s great gifts to us as we visited two of the farmers there and sampled some blueberry goodies.

Maine has wild blueberries and we were blessed to visit with a farmer whose family tends to the wild blueberries. We had fresh hot blueberry pie at her store ala mode. Yum! We had a great visit with her about farming and the struggles they face with their product. The wild blueberries are indigenous to Maine and are, therefore, naturally resistant to many pests. One farmer we spoke to said that his family has been tending to the blueberries for 200 years. There are 38,660 acres of wild Blueberries in Maine. They are grown on a two year cycle. Each year half of the grower’s land is managed to encourage flower bud growth and the other half is prepared for harvest.

“The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything wholesale, and pays the frieght both ways.” John F. Kennedy

We traveled north of here this weekend and found more farming communities. We drove along the north edge of Maine right against Canada to Fort Kent, ME. We drove adjacent to the St John River for many miles. Canada was two blocks away but we didn’t try to crossover as we were told it is quite an ordeal to do that.

Finally, the trees opened up and we saw farms and farmland. I had one very happy farmer on my hands. He breathed a deep sigh of total relief. One thing he hates is ground that is unable to be productive. Many of the farms looked in good shape and there were multiple small stands along the way selling new potatoes, peas, cucmbers, etc. Crops of beets, oats, sunflowers, wheat ready to harvest and prairie hay were seen. We even saw one Zimmatic circle for irrigation. The fields are small and hilly compared to Kansas but beautiful. One farmer was working ground in the US and we could see his counterpart in Canada also working ground. We wondered if some farmers have land in both countries.

Rainbow on East Grand Lake (View from our cottage)

“ I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want to own.” Andy Warhol

Due to the smaller fields we saw many smaller tractors, potato harvesters, and blueberry buggies. My IHC guy was so happy to see the older tractors still in use. It was delightful to see agriculture thriving in this state in many ways. Some of the land appeared to be worked with a moldboard plow. The sod turned up and productive is a wonderful sight to see.