FINALLY Planting

Conditions were borderline but finally some corn in planted. 1st day problems with new planter as usual but ran pretty well. Didn't get in a hurry and got about 50-60 acres planted. Forcast looks wet wet wet for the next week but I am way less stressed with at least something in the ground-even if it is only a small percentage.

With as warm and wet as it has been I am going to have to switch back to spraying before planting anymore-going to take a lot more roundup-but that is what mother nature has given us.

I don't want to complain about rain too much as we may be begging for it in July and August, but if the forcast hold I would bet not much will happen before the 2nd week of May.

Still Nothing to Report

Still too cold and wet here to do anything in the field. Corn is all labeled and laid out in the order it will be planted. I spent about 20 minutes walking around the shed looking at equipment and trying to find something to do, for the first time in 5 years I can honestly say I can't find anything to work on-it feels odd. Suppose I could do some stuff on the combine but that just seems wrong before anything is planted.

From the look of the weather probably not much going to happen before May 1.

The girls and I did go out and picked up trash in the ditches. What is wrong with people? We picked up almost a 50 gallon trash can full of bottles, cans, cigarette packages, etc. Found a 1/2 full can of hairspray and a cell phone charger, lots of other junk. Apparently Bud Light bottles and Miller cans are the most popular beers around here. I wish these people would think for a second, a glass bottle can ruin a $800 tractor tire when mowing roads. I would love to catch someone doing it and follow them home and dump my trash in their yard for a few days.

Watching and Waiting

Still cold and wet here, I don't anticipate any fieldwork this week or next week. Soil temps need to be about 55 degrees for corn and it is getting to the low 40s at night for the next week.

Probably a little premature but I went and picked up all chemicals for this year. It looks like the late start to planting will push planting and spraying times together so one less thing to do once the planter gets rolling. While it wasn't dry enough to do any fieldwork we were able to get the 4 wheeler out and do some spot spraying in the worst of the weedy areas and pick up some rocks.

Profit margins are going to be a lot tighter this year so I was able to save a couple bucks and acre by getting chemicals in bulk tanks. We will combine them in an inductor as they get loaded into the sprayer. This will mean a lot less handling and disposing of all the 2.5 gallon plastic jugs.

Rain rain go away

Lots of rain here in the last week. I am starting to sound like a broken record with not much new information. I got the disk out Sat morning and tried to work a couple gulleys shut but they were too wet. Some flatter and dryer spots would have worked well but being no-till I don't touch those.

Trying to keep busy-putting new Air conditioner in big tractor and piddling around the shop.

Even if it would dry out the 10 day forecast still looks cold, so I doubt any corn will be planted in this area in the next 10 days. I am changing my anticipated start date from April 13 to April 20.

Waiting and waiting

Not a lot to write about this week. We did get all of our corn seed delivered.

Planter is ready to go but calendar and 10 day forecast both tell me to chill out for the next couple week at least. Some early birds have gotten out and worked some end rows or put down Anhydrous on some drier fields, but usually not much happens around here before April 1. After that is will be crazy as always. Personally I am trying to get a bit ahead on my day job work so that when fieldwork time comes I can minimize planting interruptions, that always makes me a bit nervous around planting and harvesting time.

Next week I will probably get the disk out ready to close some gulleys if it gets dry. Not much shop work remaining.

I thought spring was coming

Last week really got the juices flowing. I think I put about 60 hours work in the shop over a 4 day period. Now everyting is almost ready to go, and the cold had me back inside in front of the computer for a couple days.

Grain markets moved up nicely this week as I sold 25% of what was left from last years corn. Hoping that sparks a rally for the rest of it, if past history hold my sales usually do.

This next week I plan to purchase the fuel we will use for this year, a little over 1,000 gallons. It is nice to see it so much cheaper than last year, and it reminds me of one of the benefits of being no-till. I would hate to be buying two or three times as much.

I am starting to see more seed being delivered around the country-so while it may not feel like it we all know that less than a month from now there will be tractors rolling in Central, Il.

I am down in St. Louis for a couple days and saw some ground had been worked today.

Feelings of Spring

They say in the spring a young man’s heart turns to thoughts of love. The warm weather this weekend had this farmers heart turn to thoughts of planting.

It is really little too early to think of planting in our area but a couple days in the 60s and 70s has one thinking. Crop insurance won’t cover any corn planted before April 6, and the fields are still well soaked. I have a date of April 13^th in my head to start planting, let’s see if the weather cooperates. The warm weather allowed the girls and I to get out on the 4 wheeler and had a lot of fun scouting the new farm this past week. Given how much bean stubble we had last year (beans erode much easier than corn) I would say that both farms are in very good shape. A few minor eroded spots will be need to be worked closed before planting but nothing major.

I took advantage of the warm weather this weekend and the driveway received a much needed layer of gravel and I borrowed a neighbors scraper to get it really nice and smooth. The planter rebuild project from the winter was wrapped up sooner than expected so I finished putting a new boom on the sprayer as that was problematic last year. And found some time to put a new interior in the lower part of the planter tractor. Hopefully that will quiet it down enough so I don’t have to have the radio blaring to hear it.

Crop insurance deadline for sign up is March 16, I had my appointment last week. Having only been farming 5 years this I am starting to realize how good the last few years have been. I had an older famer once tell me that in every 10 years you will lose money two times, make a lot of money two times, and make a little the other six. This is the first year where my insurance will not cover the cost of production-so in that aspect it is a little scary. The main reason is the high price of fertilizer and seed that I purchased last fall, it sure would have been a lot cheaper had I waited until spring. Grain markets are starting to go up a little the last couple days, and hopefully are finally separating from the downward spiral of the stock market, it that trend continues I know a lot of farmers will be breathing easier and have a lot more fun putting in a crop for which there is a positive payout.

I know in a month things are going to get really busy-so in the next couple weeks I am going to really try to spend some extra time with the Julie and the kids.