Frantic on the Farm

My bed did not want to give me up this morning. It wanted me to stay and keep it warm all morning long. I'm glad I didn't give in to the temptation. It would have been nice though...

At the exact moment that my feet were swinging out from under the blankets - early - My Sweetheart, who had been up since before 5am,  called me on the radio. He briefly shared his plans for the day and the first item on the agenda was for me to wake up Dear Son. Oh, how I hated to do that. I knew how late he had stayed out seeding last night, I knew he was tired, I knew he was sleeping, but I knew I had to head to the basement and try to rouse him. So, down I went and up he got!   And knowing that I had a limited amount of time to try and get a maximum amount of stuff done I had to get cracking.

So after a quick shower, very quick shower, and a hurried breakfast I threw lunches in the big lunch boxes for the guys, cleaned out the dishwasher, loaded it, threw a load of laundry in, ran the vacuum over the  floor and opened the door  to let Ross, the census guy into the house. And this was all before 8:30. Why do we have to fill out 2 census forms??? The small, easy one, and the huge 10000 page agriculture one? Ok, that might be a tad exaggerated, but couldn't they combine the 2 for those of us in the agriculture industry?  And why, during the busiest time of the year for farmers, do they send out those forms anyway?  Oh dear, I guess I just ranted.

Shortly after Ross, the census guy left, and Dear Son was on his way to the south farm to take over the seeding from My Sweetheart, My Sweetheart pulled into the yard with the semi. It needed to have the last few bushels of 1 kind of lentil seed cleaned out, put into a different truck, and then filled up again with a different lentil seed and more fertilizer. I quickly gathered up everything that was needed - the broom, and the shovel, and took a few other things out, and started helping. And, no, I didn't crawl into the back of the semi.  But I was the "hand me this and hand me that" assistant. After about an hour My Sweetheart was good to go, and so was I. Well, I really wasn't, but I went anyway. My hair was all askew and my face was without the necessary makeup.  But My Sweetheart needed me down south to help move the trucks et al from 1 field to another field.  And after that, I had to run into town to pick up the mail, a prescription, and a few groceries.

I arrived back in the house just before lunch time.  Darling Daughter was busy baking home-made banana-nut muffins! What a treat to walk into a kitchen with a lovely daughter baking!! After lunch I quickly set some buns, then my brother came out for a little while, and then I caught my breath! I've been catching it for about an hour.  An hour of doing mostly nothing.  Just sitting.  And walking the dogs.  And preparing supper.

Ah, time to sit still. It really is good to be able to take the time to do that.  Sit still, I mean. I'm going to be busy after supper panning the buns and baking, but when that's done, DD and I will be sitting down for a movie. Her choice! I'll make the popcorn while she picks out the movie.

It has been, and looks like it will continue to be, a very good day.

Seeding

DD, Mom, and I nicely returned from the city. My Sweetheart needed me to do some errands for him and I needed to buy a few groceries and Mom had her "city list" and DD needed some new jeans. Only Dear Son didn't need anything today!

I really don't enjoy a day in the city for "running around" - it is just too tiring! I went to the first place with part of our garage door opener - I needed to take it to make sure that the new circuit board thingie that was ordered for it would work when it was hooked up.  It did. But it took longer than I wanted to wait around to find out. But I waited anyway.  Then we zoomed off to lunch.  Tim's. My kind of soup wasn't on the menu today. So I had chili. And then I got a phone call.  My Sweetheart needed me to go to the Steel place and get some nuts and bolts. 3 1/2 inches by 3/8 of an inch.  And locking nuts. I dropped Mom and DD off at the mall. Lucky girls.  Then I zipped to the other side of the city, with phone book close by for the address, and found myself in the Steel and Salvage Store. Isn't that exciting? I had never been there. I'm pretty sure it's easier for My Sweetheart to find his way around the pharmacy looking for feminine stuff even though it's not needed anymore, than it is for me to find my way around a steel and salvage store. The guy behind the counter looked at me as though I were an alien.  I felt like one in there. 
"I might need some help."  -me
"Oh." - him
"nuts and bolts" - me.
"plastic or steel?"
"Fine or course?'
"locking or not?"
3 phone calls to My Sweetheart later, and I was on my way outta there. Hopefully never to return. Who knew it could be so complicated getting nuts and bolts?  It would have been easier to get them at Nutters, but My Sweetheart likely wouldn't have appreciated eating them.

Then I zagged over to Armstrong Implements with the GPS thing from the tractor. My time there was much more pleasant. The guy at the counter saw me with this thing and knew exactly who to send me to for help. And that guy didn't make me feel like an idiot. No phone calls to My Sweetheart there.  Nosirree!

Finally, my farmer store shopping was over and I was able to go to the mall!  I found a lovely Mother's Day gift for Mom. Darling Daughter found 3 pair of jeans for what 1 pair of jeans would have cost! I bought myself some lovely body lotion.  And then off to the grocery store! I really dislike shopping for groceries. But it's just one of those things that needs doing. 6 hours after leaving home for the city and we were back home.  Just in time to run one of the half tons to the south field after quickly making a lunch for the boys!

They're seeding!

Busyness is Underway!

"Dad woke me up at 6." That simple statement, spoken by my Dear Son, were the first words he spoke to me after I went down south to give a hand. And so begins the start of the very busy season on the farm.
Early mornings, busy days and  late nights will be the norm now until the seeding is completed.  But before the seeding gets underway the boys are busy putting  Edge out. I asked My Sweetheart what, exactly, "edge" is, and the best he could tell me was that it was a chemical granular substance. It is spread on the ground, where the lentils will be seeded, and then will kill the weeds. It needs heat or moisture to activate. And judging by the clouds out there today, it looks like it will be moisture activated before heat activation takes place.

We don't spread Edge everywhere - just on our south land. The weeds tend to be the worst there. The main weed that we are fighting is kochia - that particular weed can look something like a mini Christmas tree. So the Edge, which is something like "pea-coloured baby food color" with the texture of sugar or salt goes into the Valmar spreader and is distributed on the land.

The backhoe is "holding" for lack of better word, a bag of Edge. This bag weighs approximately 1200 pounds.

The tractor is pulling the Valmar spreader.

My Sweetheart is backing up the unit to the backhoe, which is being operated by DS.

Dear Son at the helm!

Getting the "edge" into position!

Releasing the "edge" into the Valmar.  You can kind of see it trickling out of the bag. Baby food pea colour - blech!

The "edge" comes out and spreads out through all those hoses...

and comes out where you see those yellow things that are spread out evenly.

So, after I watched My Sweetheart and Dear Son load up the Valmar, we moved the backhoe to a different field.

and on the way there My Sweetheart took a couple minutes to smooth out some ruts.

There will be lots of sloughs to go around this year!

The trail will need to be bypassed!

And even this is something to watch out for. If you look closely you can see where the land is a darker color. That is a wet spot and likely very muddy. There are many such "spots" on the land too, that will need to be driven around.

The clouds are building up. And yes, there was rain in that cloud.  So after tarping everything up, the boys came home today. It actually got too windy to be spreading out Edge.  Maybe this evening it will be calmer!

So, because he can't be down south helping with the Edge, My Sweetheart is now on the road with the semi.  He is hauling a load of lentils to the buyer. I wouldn't be surprised if DS is having a little nap so that he's wide awake for the start of the Predators-Canucks series which gets under-way tonight!

I'm soon going to start baking scones for DD's and my "Royal Wedding" festivities! Starting early this evening we'll kick off the "Big Day" with a movie marathon which will include "The Young Victoria", "The King's Speech" and "The Queen!"  We might even have to find some fastenators to stick in our hair!

Getting Ready to Fish

We headed to the city today. The ice is off the dug-out, so it was time to go and pick up the rainbow trout! And since Costco was so close to the fish farm we made a detour and stopped there first. I wasn't overly enthusiastic about the Christmas-rush sized crowd of people that was shopping, but surprisingly, we were in and out of there in about an hour and a half.  Quite a feat for us!  After a quick lunch we headed out to the fish farm. Two lovely, very clean Golden Retrievers met us! I was wondering how they could manage to stay out of the mud and muck. I guess that's why they were allowed to meet and greet us.

After loading up the 800 little rainbow trout for the dug-out we headed home. 800 weren't for us. We picked up some for our neighbor right across the road and some for our neighbor straight south of us.

There sure was a lot of water in the fields on the way.  And halfway between the city and home we saw 1 field with thousands and thousands and thousands of geese. And there were thousands more flying overhead. I really wish I would have taken my camera along for THAT sight. I wonder if the geese were wishing that they would have waited a week or so before leaving the south and warmth to come north and to the cold.

When we got home and unpacked the Costco stuff, My Sweetheart and I headed out to the dug-out.

My Sweetheart is putting a screen in front of the culvert to prevent wayward fish from escaping.

Securing the screen...

If you look close enough you might see a fish in the industrial strength bag that was it's home for the past few hours..

Putting 1 of the bags in the dug-out to acclimatize the trout...

Here are the 3 bags with 350 trout.  They are wiggling with excitement before being released to their new home.

Ready, set,

Go....or ready to go anyway.  This little guy should be about 10 inches in length by next summer.

The new home for the rainbow trout.

When the trout are bigger and jumping, they just might catch a glimpse of my hometown - if they jump high enough..

I'm glad I took the time to accompany My Sweetheart to the fish farm today. I'm glad I went with him to the dug-out and saw the whole fish-releasing process. I was able to help by handing him stuff- not that there was a lot of stuff to hand him, just twine, a knife, hammer, that kind of stuff.  Hmmm, I just might need some help in the house...



It Must Be Spring



This morning, when I was out for my walk with Chico, Bentley and Lady, I was serenaded by my favorite sound of spring - the meadowlark.  It was the first time I heard it this year, and I am so glad I did! I smiled when it sang. It seemed to follow me on my walk, although I couldn't see it. It's beautiful song brought forth many smiles from me.

I usually walk from the farm and head south towards the highway. It's about a mile walk to the highway, and I cut my walk off probably about 100 feet or so from there - for the protection of the dogs.  The traffic on the highway seemed exceptionally busy this morning. Lots of cars and trucks and semis were going by. And just before I got to my destination I heard another sound of spring...



Something very similar to this was going down the highway. For my non-farming friends who might be reading this, and wondering - this is an air drill.  It is pulled behind a tractor, filled with seed, and used to plant the crop. This isn't a picture of ours though - ours is tucked away in the pole shed until we're ready for it. I found this picture on an auction site. This spring the seeding will probably be later rather than earlier. Anyway, seeing and hearing the tractor while on my walk, convinced me that spring must be here!

My sweetheart is busy hauling durum today. Most years all, or at least most, of the hauling would have been finished by now. That is typically one of the farming jobs that gets done over winter. This year was weird though - I think there's still many hundreds of  thousands of bushels of last year's harvest  from many farmers that needs to be hauled.  And this is a very busy time of year.

Our yard is too muddy to get to the bins.  And it was too muddy in front of the pole shed to get the semi out. So, bright and early this morning, My Sweetheart was outside, dumping gravel in front of the pole shed so he could get his semi out. He's hauling from the north farm, where surprisingly, the yard is quite dry. He was glad he took a drive over there yesterday to check it out.  And glad there was room at the terminal for the durum. He will definitely be "making hay while the sun shines" today, so to speak!

We are going to enjoy this spring weather while we can.  I just checked the forecast. Winter still is looking like it wants to linger - wet snow is supposed to be coming on Thursday. Hopefully My Sweetheart will be able to haul 2 full days before then. I am praying for safety for him while he does. And also praying for no mechanical breakdowns while he's hauling.

For the next couple days I hope to be enjoying spring!