The Birdsfoot Trefoil actually came up

I am always amazed when what I planted comes up. I may be conditioned to farming failures. 

This fall I planted Timothy grass for hay and I also added Birdsfoot Trefoil as an experiment.

The Trefoil, (or lotus major) is a legume which adapts well to lower pH soils, fixes Nitrogen, and is not supposed to cause bloat like alfalfa can do. Although, this will never be a pasture so I don't think this matters. 

I planted Trefoil mostly because my friend that owns the 3.5 acre field wanted to plant it years ago and only three plants made it though the summer.

I planted this a couple weeks ago somewhat against the recommendations of the seed salesman. I probably should have listened to the seed guy a fifty pound bag cost me almost $300.

Yesterday I checked on the field and I saw little broadleaf sprouts in with the Timothy. 

This was a no-tilled field so I may have trouble with frost heave if there is a lot of freezing nights. But, we shall see what we shall see.

Trefoil is the broadleaf in the center of the furrow. You can see little Timothy sprouts if you look closely. I am choosing to believe that the more mature grass plants are Timothy plants left over from the first planting.  Sprouts between the rows are no what I planted...

I prepared this field in the spring. It was disked twice and the harrowed and rolled four times. I then waited for a sprout and applied Glyphosate. After the sprout died I used my no-till drill to plant Timothy seed at 1/4" deep. There was a good rain afterwards and I think a lot of seed sprouted. However, it never rained for the next three months. 

I controlled summer annuals (sort of) by mowing so I will very likely have a lot of late summer weeds next year.

I replanted in late October into a damp seed bed. I planted the Timothy at 10lbs per acre and the Trefoil at five pounds per acre on every other row. (Although if you look at my photo you will see Trefoil on every row so it appears my plugs were leaking.)

My planting depth was supposed to be 1/4." The Great Plains 1500 with the CPH hitch is hard to set to a shallow depth. I put the Trefoil in the main box and the Timothy was in the smalls seeds box. The Trefoil was a coated seed so it was about the size of clover seed. Timothy is much smaller and lighter.

The small seed set up on by GP 1500 drops the seed behind the V-opener and right in front of the press wheel. Generally this means that the small seed plants in about a one inch wide band a little more shallow than what goes through the main seed box and out though the openers. The small seeds are covered by the action of the press wheels. 

There is also a floating harrow but I raised the harrow up. I wanted to leave a trench which holds moisture in dry weather.

I applied 6 gallons per acre of 10-34 liquid fertilizer which is banded in the row with the seed. This should help the plant grow through the cold wet winter.

This is the back of the Great Plains 1500. It is a rather poor view but I suppose you get the idea of how it works.

The Fescue is coming up, Timothy is coming up, Annual Ryegrass is up, Orchard grass is not, rows are crooked and I am lazy.

Global warming, or is it climate change, or is it man-made global cooling, or is it just the crazy cycles of nature, has resulted in a warm wet two weeks. 

The Great Plains 1500 is a really nice drill. It has liquid fertilizer, row monitors, and 15 foot is a good size. But... It is a constant battle to not bury the seed three inches deep when planting into worked ground. I think I am going to buy a new set of down pressure springs and then cut an inch or two off of the old springs and use the shorter springs for worked ground. It is kind of a pain to change the springs but I very rarely do the sort of no-till where you are drilling Wheat seed into ground that is as hard as concrete. (Which is what I used to do every fall)  I have thought about mounting air shocks on the openers so I could easily change the pressure but that would be a lot of work. I think it could be done with mounting brackets from Great Plains. Of course there would be buying 24 air shocks and mounting an air compressor....

My grass seed plantings are coming up. Checking them every day makes them come up faster. There was zero difference in the side of the drill that had the fancy seed inoculant. (See Realgrowers, Recharge inoculant) 

I am really disappointed that I cannot tell which side of the drill had the special treatment. It all seemed like a great idea. The seed is putting down roots really well but I can't see that one side of the drill has better roots than the other. I guess I should have planted an isolated test strip and flagged it off.

I am also disappointed in my driving. I cannot seem to drive straight with this Great Plains CPH-15 hitch.  The PFH-15 that I had on my original Great Plains 1500 was a much better design. It had a rock shaft for lifting the drill and the lift wheels stayed in alignment much better. There was also a better lock system for locking the center pivot when doing long straight rows in loose soil. 

This CPH-15 hitch has always wandered and every twitch of the steering wheel transmits back though the drill. I do wish I could afford auto-steer.

Or better yet, a new drill, a White 195 Workhorse, and Autosteer. 

I was talking about needed farm equipment with my nephew yesterday. He is pretty frustrated with the lack of a loader tractor grapple set up for loading hay. I was trying to get him to have his brother look for White 2-105 or 2-85 or 2-110 tractors where he is teaching school in Colorado. I see those on Tractorhouse with front end loaders fairly ofter for under $10,000. 

The Nephew is determined to put proper beds on three trucks. He has one almost done and is ready to start on the second. 

I was noting the list of tractors to repair this winter... Hesston 4690 baler with a bad engine, White 2-135 with a major water leak under the turbo and three speed issues, Minneapolis-Moline G-1355 with three speed issues, White 2-150 with injector pump issues, Minneapolis-Moline G-706 with engine swap and transmission issues, IH 656 hydro with PTO out and hydraulics issues, MM M-670 super with engine problems, Mercury-Pettibone Hay Squeeze engine swap, Mercury-Pittibone Hay Squeeze with bad mast lift cylinder and bent clamp, and an 806 IH that needs an engine rebuild....

Plus, his uncle is lazy...

The government is not there to help you, moving a friend, planting rye

Yesterday I helped a friend move some toolboxes. Every time I go down his driveway I get pissed at government and it makes me want to vote trump just out of spite. Not that Trump will actually fire the local head of NRCS or probably even have an affect on funding. Just because I want to see government plunged into Chaos.

My friend (who shall remain nameless at this point) sold his farm (in good faith) to the local soil conservation district and they screwed him. It took a decade. It took until there was a new head of the district. It took until the apparent the contact high that comes from spending your life with a pretty decent pothead farmer husband wore off for the chairman of the county board, but it happened.

You can tell from the sign. Look at that No-Trespassing sign. It is not "your/our" property, it is theirs. 

The county only took the best and cleanest ground to turn into the fabled Oak Savannah. They are letting the rest of the acres become over-run with teasel, thistle, blackberries. And of COURSE, they restrict access.

I came home and no-tilled Rye into Barley ground. This is not that great an idea as you can't control the volunteer Barley other than winter kill. However, our neighbor really wanted five acres of Rye for his whiskey project and so we did it. 

I planted 600lbs and the counter read 7 acres when I stopped. I was hoping for 600lb to 4 acres ratio as I wanted a higher crop density. Unfortunately, I went by the chart under the grain drill lid instead of measuring the drill output like I should have done.

Haste makes was every time. After spending an hour or so cleaning and setting up the drill it would seem I could have taken an extra ten minutes to check the seed rate. But, it was cold, and it started to shower, and I am a Lazy Farmer...

It was my 26 year anniversary and I was supposed to have started a fire and turned on the porch light for my wife who was working late.

I am a bad husband. 

I decided not to give her this chainsaw and tell her I purchased it for her as an anniversary gift. No sense adding insult to injury...

My friend explained that it had been setting for years since he got a heat pump mini-split and didn't burn wood anymore. Plus, it is a bugger to start as all newer Stihl saws tend to be. So I had to try it when I got home. Rosco is not completely impressed. He was strongly suggesting a pickup ride and did not give a rat's bottom about chainsaws. It did not start on the first pull.

Sunday Farming Foibles

Sunday did not go as well as I was expecting yesterday when I wrote my blog.

I quit Saturday night out of frustration with my driving I could not drive straight. I could see quite a ways down the field in the dark with headlights and a bright moon but my driving and the GPS did not agree. I was always making corrections.

When I got to the field I could immediately see the damages. The GPS was deflecting around trees and low spots in the field. I think this is due to the extreme angles of satellites being low on the horizon. The field is a long 30 acre rectangle that runs East/West and I have had problems years ago when I first started using GPS. 

Just a bit off, plus a lot of driver corrections. I suspect $8,000 and full autosteer would solve this issue....

I had to drive home to get fertilizer. I am mixing a special fertilizer with 10-34. It contains humic and soil enzymes. The people at the Co-Op swear it will make the seed pop out of the ground. I know everyone should laugh at me for spending money on a product that no one can tell me what is made of when really I just need to boost fertilizer rates and add lime. But, it came with glowing reviews from people who are really skeptical. 

The kid that loaded me spilled the beans, "this smells like shit..." he said.

I am pretty sure it is a humanure product. It has that stench. I don't think I will use it again. However, Saturday's planting will provide a great test. When I went to check my seed depth and look for plugged fertilizer tubes I realized there was a problem.

I am planting Orchard grass on 15" rows at 8lbs per acre. I am putting on a fertilizer mix of 5 gallons 10-34, 3 gallons of mystery additive, and two gallons of water per acre for a total of ten gallons. However I soon realized I had more acres than fertilizer so I reduced my application rate to 6 gallons per acre.

But what went wrong...

The drill has 7.5" spacing with fertilizer on every row. To get to 15" spacing I block off ever other row of seed and turn off fertilizer to every other row. It is really easy to get the fertilizer and the seed rows mismatched. Somewhere around row 6 I turned off two rows next to each other and continued that way until row 16. So on rows 6-16 the fertilizer is on the blank row and not on the seed row. I guess that is my test plot.

Once I got going and fixed the wandering rows I noticed the path painted on my computer screen showed that my fertilizer rates were going crazy. The Farmer GPS program interfaces with my MicroTrak Spraymate II and changes paint color in relation to the amount of fertilizer applied. It is also programed to offset the drill when planting with every other row so you can plant back and forth. 

So imagine row one is turned off and row twenty four is turned on. Going one direction you have two row one rows next to each other and the other way you have two row 24's next to each other. So with the row 1's you have 7.5" spacing and row 24's you have 30" skip. (If I drive perfectly, which I don't)

But, I digress...

The fertilizer pump was acting like the impeller was plugged or spun off the shaft or the hydraulic drive was skipping. So I had to change pumps.

I am expecting incredible yield from this one spot!

In the mean time I was sent a zoom link to see my Nephew preach. It was pretty funny to hear the moderator say, "I see Uncle "Bud" has logged in.  Nephew is teaching at an Accelerated Christian Education school in Colorado hay and horse country. This will be an excellent adventure for him.

I left the phone in the pickup and used headphones so no one could hear me swear and installed the spare pump, made sure all the fertilizer tubes were working and soon I was planting. I finished around 5 p.m. and had 50 acres on the counter. Thirty acres of worked ground and I emptied the drill on 15-20 acres of no-till.

I woke up to rain and like 60 degree temps this morning. Seems like good growing weather to me.

Have a nice day!

A foggy Sunday morning and the reflections that follow

 I woke up in the dark this morning. I looked out the window at 6 am and there was no sun. There was also no rain. My wife is away with the ladies so I didn't havre anyone to remind me that last night I said I was only working till 9 p.m. because I wanted to get an early start.

So I fell back into the semi awake state that happens when you are too stinking lazy to get out of bed. 

At 7 a.m. the room was lighter and I ventured a glance out the window.  The fog had rolled in and moitsure was dripping off of every surface. Nice weather to load the drill, I thought and I rolled over and pulled a pillow over my head.

Then I heard the geese and realized that summer was over and I still have a lot to do...

Motivation has become a serious issue. I can't keep blaming a broken leg or a crappy job for my laziness. I can blame getting sick the other day. I am still super tired and cough all the time. But, I am walking it off.

My buddy who wishes to not be named in my blog told me (as he does every other day) that my problem is guilt for the white race oppressing everyone else under the sun. I told him that he was absolutely correct and his insight had changed my life. He said I was a sarcastic arsehole and he would have fired me too.

Which brings me to the anniversary of my blog being discovered by Linfield University. Which is somewhere around this date last year. It is pretty disappointing to note that being outed has made no difference in my stats.

I am not sure what they accomplished by getting rid of me as they did not use me as any sort of example and I can now say all sorts of negative things if I really cared. Surprisingly, I am still in the loop.

Linfield funnies, Reshmi is still a troll, Jessica Rabbit Christina Hendricks is highly self motivated and has taken over her department and has been accused of being a bully. This is funny because I ended up defending her. Of course she is doing well, she is one of the very few that is actually qualified.

Meanwhile roofs are leaking, waterlines breaking, there is no mechanic, but the payroll guy got himself a hefty raise for setting around all day and playing with PayCom. I suspect he gets extra points for adopting a 30 year old Haitian and getting him free tuition.

One day the texts with the laugh emojis detailing hilarious mismanagements will stop. I am much less interested now. It is not my college. Then I will see the practice field and its five different kinds of invasive grass patches and feel sadness at wasting eight years of my life on idiots. I should have taken the job at George Fox.

But, I digress... 

I think it is time to plant!

I replace bushings on my Great Plains 1500

 I am back and work and full of optimism. This lasted for an hour. It is cold and foggy and I am replacing a "few" opener bushings on my Great Plains 1500 no-till drill.

The GP1500 uses the Straight Arm 00 openers which are hooked to the 4" tool bar in an offset manner. They use the same mounting. bracket but turn the hinge point opposite directions for alternating openers.  So half the opener arms are easy to get to and half are a pain in the butt.

If i was smart. I would just remove the easy openers and set them aside for later. Then I would replace the bushings on the remaining openers and go plant my orchard grass. As it is on 15" spacing.

But, that means I would disable the drill for wheat and I expect a call any time to plant some crazy hillside because a neighbor is behind.

Also, because of the design of the hinge on the 00 straight arm opener, the pivot bolts must be cut between the opener and the bracket with a cutoff wheel. The design uses a carriage bolt though a steel bushing. The opener arm has plastic bushings with shoulders. They pivot around the stationary steel tube. Over time the tube and carriage bolt actually rust solid and must be cut at each end to remove the opener.

When I reassemble the opener pivot I coat the carriage bolt with anti-seize or sticky grease. I also tried painting the inside of the tube and hoping this will help also.

Of course everything is super easy to get at to work on 

It should be a winter job, but I broke my leg last winter and didn't get around to it the winter before.

It got me a little depressed thinking about my previous post on how to make money farming the low budget way. 

You have to work every moment to survive, this is fine if farming is also your hobby. But if I could figure out how to work for micro managers and enjoy it, that would be a good life. NO thinking at work. Come home and live!

Friends Don't Let Friends become farmers but if you really want my advice, I don't think it is a bad idea

My lovely and gracious wife has imposed a quarantine. My ribs and back ache from coughing. However, I think I am well as I am worried about getting my work done.

I have ordered a lot of parts for the grain drill and I must install them. I don't have much work lined up but it needs to be ready to go.

This worry is a good thing. Not to belabor a long dead horse but... But after spending eight years at a dead end job, it is nice to have "performance" anxiety. Plus, my unemployment just ran out so I really am on my own time!

I have been on my phone a lot while propped in a chair trying not to cough. There are lot of earnest young farmer videos on my Boomerbook and instagram feeds.  It is always the same jaw. High prices for materials and land, low commodities prices, high intrest, rates, high rent, old guys not turning loose, and now there is just a hint of resentment towards megafarms.

Many modern farmers secretly love megafarmers as we all think we have the special key to farming better than anyone else. We don't... 

It seems to me that nerve, cleverness, luck, and just being willing to start over from nothing multiple times is really the key to anything.  Every potential farmer should memorize this advice from my favorite disillusioned colonialist. (Yes, you can be a woman farmer and apply this universal advice)

There is also this poem which I feel has relevance to any of my nephews who may stumble across this blog.

He wandered down the mountain grade

    Beyond the speed assigned—
A youth whom Justice often stayed
    And generally fined.

He went alone, that none might know
    If he could drive or steer.
Now he is in the ditch, and Oh!
    The differential gear!

But I digress..

My problem as a farmer is that I never intended to be a farmer. I just came back to the farm one summer and never left...

I was like many of kids I met working at the College, I didn't know what to do with my life and my parents thought going to college would raise my status. I caught the beginning of the modern Disneyesque fallacy of "follow your dreams," and didn't listen to my parents advice to pick a good career.

Follow your dreams is an excellent idea/goal if you have a solid background to build from. If you do not really know what you like, if you are interested in lots of different things, but are not especially talented at one thing, being told to follow your dreams is failure. 

I should have become a teacher or professor.

I grew up when people thought college would change your life and when people believed you could do anything you wanted with a classic liberal arts education. This was true for some of my friends who went to Colleges where they could change their social caste or build ongoing relationships. I went to George Fox University and Rosedale Bible College. I have no interest in bland modern interpretations of Christianity, I don't like modern worship music, I did not become a member of the Friends Church, or a "politically conservative, theologically challenged," Mennonite, or a douchey white Liberal. 

I somehow accidentally became a grumpy farmer...

But that was a lot of rambling to set up a background so I can say that if I was a young person who wanted to farm in todays world, this is what I would do.

There are three paths to intentionally starting out as a farmer. 

You can work your butt off for your parents and neighbors and build up your farm as you are able. If you get a job with a successful farmer a lot of times they will help you get started. 

You can get a job out of high school and get a retirement account started early, save up money, build credit, learn a trade or skill which you supplement your farm income.

Go to college...

Going to college is the long route. If you go to a trade school, you can start making good money and start a retirement account. You might also look for jobs in the agriculture sector. For example if you are a carpenter, diesel mechanic, welder and work with farmers you will build relationships and get opportunities to pick up ground from an insider perspective. 

If you get a four year degree, for the love of Pete, get something useful. Focus on Accounting, Science, learn how to write grants, study crop science, biology. If you can put up with the BS, try environmental science or forestry. (Of course there are always exceptions. I knew a student who majored in archaeology that was essentially recruited out of college and has a great government job where she gets to travel and gets paid well) 

I also know of young people who got two year Agricultural Science degrees from the Community College, or four year degrees from Oregon State and got jobs in ag related industries and used that to leverage into farming.

When you decided to farm you have to make some essentially philosophical decisions. Are you going to follow the "go big or go home," path or do you want to build slowly.  

Either way you have the advantage of the USDA young farmer program where you can get low interest loans and other help. (This is where I went wrong. I did not take advantage of this program and expand when I needed to do so.)

I am not going to elaborate on the "Go Big Or Go Home," concept as I am not a plunger. I am going to use more what I wish I would have done.

(Also, don't ditch your first job to go to Costa Rica and then just screw around for several years. This is a bad plan...)

When you really start thinking about farming you have to look at where you can fit in to make extra cash. 

When you plant a crop, you may have one or two years before you see a return. When you find ground that you can afford to farm you will soon see reason why it was cheap. It may be wet, have 4.1 pH, have serious weed issues, be on a 10 percent slope, or just be a lot of small odd shaped field. This is fine, if you have to do it you have to do it.

But, you have to have cash flow and you will have to have a skill that you can rent out to other farmers. Truck driving is an excellent option as a Farm Endorsement is easy to get, but if you have a CDL then you can have more options. Although, I would recommend staying in the Ag community as they best way to get ahead is though relationships that you build. Welding, electrical, accounting, carpentry, are all good side gigs.

Don't fall into the new equipment trap but don't hold on to junk. 

You will have to finance key pieces of equipment, especially if you are doing custom work.

When I started doing custom no-till planting I financed the drill.  However, I rented it the first year and figured out a business plan. I lined up twice as many acres as I needed to make the payment. I used a Minneapolis-Moline G1355 that I paid $4,000 for several years previously. 

I soon discovered that I needed front wheel assist. I then bought a 1984 White 2-155 with 6,000 hours and nice paint for $17,500 and that was probably a mistake due to my lack of nerve. I should have gone one step further and bought the 1990 185 White for $25,000 as I still have that 2-155 and have put two engines and another like 8,000 hours on it.

1972 White 2-60 cost $2500. New Holland BC5070 was financed at $12,000 ten years ago and it is time to be replaced. Purchased baler because I had a deal to supply 10,000 bales a year to a feed store at $2.25 a bale. Paid for the baler. (20% down and 5%, paid for it over 3 years)

I just looked at this baler to replace my old one. It is newer and has a heavier frame and better hydraulics. Price per bale is now $4.50 to feedstore but can probably only sell 3,000 bales per year.  I passed on the purchase price of $25,000 (10% down and 7 percent on 5 years)

Previous century White tractors with cold a/c and a lot of hydraulics. This year I rebuilt one powershift and replaced a front axle, have another front axle to work on, another powershift to rebuild, a lot of electrical issues, hydraulic leaks, really wish I could upgrade to a Case/IH 7250 or a White 4-270 (and a 2-110 FWA or a decent condition 105 for the mower and baler)

The only thing I have ever found that made money reliably and I am sorry to see it end. This 2-155 has seen two Great Plains 1500 no-till drills. I really need to update the drill but out of my  original customers three are dead, two have retired, two bought their own drills, plus the government payments have changed, and chemicals are so expensive you might as well work the ground.

But I digress...

What I want to say is you have to realize what makes money. Your tractor must be reliable but there is no shame in pulling a $20,000 baler with a $2500 White 2-60 with no cab and air conditioning as long as you have the sales to make the payment.

Focus on fertility and pay attention to trends. Right now the new buzzword is Regenerative Agriculture. It is a pretty broad term but if it means more sales of Buckwheat and Annual Ryegrass and more grant opportunities, I am interested. If I am still sick, or if I am driving in circles I am going to attend these webinars.

Interact with other farmers. I tend not to. Friend networks are so important. Small farmers need to work with people they can trust. I can't tell you how many times I have hired neighbors to haul hay or unload trucks or asked for advice, only to lose my customer or lose ground.

Don't hold a grudge, but don't be a pushover. Its great to be nice and helpful and carry people who can't pay but some people will use you for self financing. Don't let it happen twice. But, don't be mad for more that one season.

Finally, that USDA beginning farmer loan program.  Use it.... If I would have had the balls to buy a farm with it 30 years ago I would be a millionaire right now. Or two balers and a stacker, or rented good ground. It is there to be used. Also, I realize I only have ten readers a week but if you are female or not a White Male, the USDA desperately wants to give you money. Take advantage of it!

The best advice I was ever given.

Know who your friends are, No one cares about your money like you do, Some people just like to talk... They are NOT your friends.

Have a happy day!

It finally rained and I am sick...

I have been planing like mad for the last week.We have had a dry fall. I should have plowed.

But plowing takes time and money. Although, making eight passes with a heavy disk also costs a lot of money and doesn't bury the straw.

Today I had planned to help Muddy Valley with packing. However, I suspect he doesn't want me to show up with a serious cough, body aches, head ache, minor temperature, and no energy. (I doubt he minds if I am also grump.)

Crop prices or terrible. There is nothing to grow that will make any profit at this point for next year.

We have ten acres of grain corn which part is going for whiskey and the rest to the local feed mill for maybe $250 a ton. I was going to grind some for my neighbor. He has been setting on it for a year. I have very glad I didn't buy any for $450 a ton as I would still have it.

I have a friend with cows and I think I am going to put all my bags of grain together and make him a mix, sell it cheap, and sell the mixer grinder and pellet mill. It is not so much that there is not money in it. I am just tired.

We planted Timothy for hay, K31 Fescue (which can go for hay for seed) and Annual Ryegrass. Annual Ryegrass is not a good price but it is cheap to grown and seems to actually sell. Annual is used for cover crop and as long as there is price supports for cover crops in the Midwest I am hoping for a market. 

I want to grow buckwheat again next year as it is an excellent rotation but the people we grew it for this year are pretty sketchy so I don't know.

I experimented with Birdsfoot trefoil as it is nitrogen fixing and tends to reseed itself in hay fields. $250 for fifty pounds so it is an experiment.

My next project is hopefully 40 acres of Orchard Grass but it is getting late and we need to spray out the annual ryegrass in the field (annual ryegrass is a weed). They sprayer is broken and it is mid October so who knows.

My neighbor who grew lots of Orchard Grass before getting a real job has been giving me advice on planting. It is much different from the advice other people have. 

I guess it is a difference in attitude. This guy is precise and methodical. What I have found do work really well is just planting really heavy.

He suggested a seed inoculant which contains soil microbes. Sort of an instant compost tea. It is called Recharge and it is really super expensive, (as all good snake oil should be.)

It is mixed at 4 oz per 50lbs of seed. I was going to buy a cement mixer from Harbor Freight to mix it but they were sold out. I just used a stick. I put the magic powder on one side of the drill so we will see if there are trails in the field.

The product was a little short on application instructions and long on propaganda so I don't now if I did it right. The first mix I made for the Timothy I mixed water with it to make a liquid and then stirred it in. The rest I just dumped in dry. I can't remember if I used it on the K-31. 

I got another miracle grow product from the local Co-Op for that and planted half the field using that product in the liquid fertilizer.

Who knows....