Round and round til the wheat's all gone. Altus, OK to Mud lake, ID. I like shiny things, even if they are red. So many buttons, can i push the red one? I might actually have to read this thing. The phone books of the places we cut are smaller. The view from the office. Normally cruising along 3-6 mph, but i'm not good enough to take pics on the go. Field was so rough the one key ring fell off the other.
One of the great lies of the world; Harvesters only cut big, flat, square fields. No field too small for 2 35' heads. Chugging along. Can't be leaving turn rows. They'd be half the field. I swear i only looked away for a second.
Not much left It better all fit On to the next one
Hvy, fill me in a little on the operation as I don't no much about large farming operations. I know that you guys are harvesting, what I would like to know is more of the business side of it. Do the farmers hire you guys to just harvest? Do they plant their own fields or hire that out too? Obviously you guys travel a lot. Nice pics.
Most of the farmers we cut for only hire out harvesting and some chemical application. There are a few that have it custom farmed from seeding all the way to harvesting. My boss does some custom seeding and planting back home, but we don't travel like we do for harvesting. Besides cutting wheat, the only other custom farmers that i know travel are silage cutters and straw balers. And the straw balers follow us. Anything else you wanna know CM?
Chemical application equipment and combines aren't used for farming wheat but maybe two weeks out of the year apiece. It just simply isn't feasible to own a piece of equipment that spends almost 50 weeks a year in the shed. The windows for spraying and harvesting are only about 2 weeks out of the year apiece. It would be different if a person farmed multiple crops. Farmers in some areas can grow wheat, corn, milo, and soybeans. Corn, milo, and soybeans require more attention than wheat, so the sprayer sees a good bit more use. The harvest on all of those crops can also fall at different times, and some have a wider harvest window than wheat, so the farmer can get a couple months use of the combine, not just a couple weeks. In those circumstances, a person might be able to justify keeping a sprayer or a combine. Otherwise, those two types of equipment depreciate too fast and cost too much to maintain to justify even a fairly cheap used machine. A tractor, plow, and drill is a different story. A tractor on that same wheat acreage is going to see several months use. Mine will have seen use on my wheat ground from May to October this year. Also, those types of used equipment have few moving parts, so buying a used one isn't really a problem. Lots of good tractors out there with 10,000+ hours on them and still going strong. I used to run one of my uncles that had nearly 24,000 hours on it when he sold it. Another benefit to hiring chemical application and harvesting done is technology. A new machine will really clean the wheat, and it will put almost all of it in the bin. The older and more used a machine gets, the more it loses. Plus it is harder to get the machine set right and there are fewer instruments to help guide the adjustments. Often times buying an older combine and cutting wheat looks cheaper on paper. But when you figure up what you are losing out the back that should be going in the bin, it isn't. Same with spraying. Chemicals and fertilizer are very expensive. A nozzle putting out too much here or there, or a little overlap here or there can get expensive in a hurry. A custom applicator with everything working correctly and a good GPS unit can often completely offset the expense of the application simply through efficiency.
where you off to now hvy, i would like a reply with some more pics please.
I made it from Pine Buffs to Casper before number 8 had ecm issues and we had to unload a combine on the side of I-25. No WiFi so can't upload more pics right now.
3rd or 4th attempt to cut this field. Hell of a commute each time the county road cut through a 10,000 acre open range pasture. Don't let the clouds fool you, it never rains in Ashland. Every 5th post had been caught by the drill. 8120 cutting the flat-er parts and 7088 cutting out terraces. Kansas farmers are the kings of farmable terraces.
Trucks couldn't make it across this draw. Not the furthest i've roaded to load trucks, but definitely the most exciting.
No pics sorted out right now, but the first video finally uploaded last night. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsGl5Ubl4Dg
How many acres do you cut in average year ? Do you go up into Canada ?
Some where in the 15-18K range for wheat. We're at 9K acres of wheat cut so far this year and i don't think we'll make it much past 13K. Our last stop is in Mud lake, ID. We cut irrigated wheat and barley from Aug 1 to Sept 15 and head back to KS for fall harvest.
Thankyou for sharing your photos as I still like to see the harvesting . I came to the US in 2000 and helped harvest wheat from Enid OK in the South to just South of the Canadian border in ND . Really enjoyed it .
how do you like the Cursor motor in your Magnum?.....do you find it better on diesel, better power band and quiter than the old Cummins 9 litre?
in all your travels your probably seeing first hand the drought conditions everyone is talking about, i know its really dry here, north east wyo, about 200 miles north of casper. were used to it this time of year in this part of wyo, if its not irrigated its brown. when the water trucks water the roads at work, the wildlife follow right behind it, birds, coyotes, foxs and other smaller animals, a guy could follow behind the water truck with a gun and a 12 pack and have some fun.
a guy could follow behind the water truck with a gun and a 12 pack and have some fun.[/QUOTE] I like that !!!!!!!!
How soon are you going to be in Mud Lake? How many acres do you have thwre?
Any chance you are looking for help? I'm in my mid 30's, currently based out of Idaho. Grew up on a potato farm. I do not have a CDL anymore, lost it for medical reasons. Cheers, 208 577 8338
When you get Idaho, welcome. I think I have seen your guys pickups in Idaho Falls in years past.
I like that !!!!!!!![/QUOTE] sure would be easy shooting, im not that cruel though, not when their just trying to get water, if i see a coyote or rabbit and i got a gun ill take a shot at them though, maybe 1ton got canned getting tired of waiting
I feel for you guys up there. We have had so much rain that it seems like we haven't had a day in the last month without battling mud. Two weeks ago we got 4.5 inches in an afternoon. If I could just send some of that water up North...
Thanks, KSSS. I've been around for almost 2 weeks now. I passed a white trail king tag in montana a couple times. Pickups might be larsen farms or might be us. The trucks go to the Budweiser elevator in IF so you'll probably see them around. It's dry all over. Corn burnt up worse than last year. On the plus side, half of it didn't drowned first like last year. If I wasn't a bit of a pyro, I'd be bored f watching fires while working. The smoke is keeping the dew on late so we haven't started cutting before 9:30 the last couple days. No internet, so no pics for a while. And my phone and hef don't seem to get along too well. I'll pass your number along. Dunno if we're looking, but if we it'll be a truck driver or cart man I think.
Slideshow put together by the big boss using pics from me, drew, him and the bossman. Back in KS and taking the weekend off after picking some pretty sad looking corn. http://www.youtube.com/#/watch?feature=plcp&v=dOtYZ--NhEk
Converted the convertible trailer to something useful again. Grain trailer was originally setup to load headers in there, but haven't done it since they switched to drapers. Pretty hard getting a 40' head in a 28' trailer. Oh, and sketchiest loading dock ever.
Big Sky Country and the "field" that came to be known as the Rock Pile. It was more of a collection of flat spots on the side of mountain. Had some rocks in it that would be called boulders anywhere else. One such boulder bent the hell out of the center draper roller. That was 1 combine down for an hour. I went between working on the header and dumping the combine that was still running. Not 15 minutes after it was up again the boss man hit that boulders twin and tweaked the draper adapter. Had to call in a pro harvest guy Some one handed driving/photography while dumping. Waiting for trucks. Did this a lot in MT. That dust is one of our trucks hitting the gravel road 15 minutes after i unloaded it More Impeccable timing
A few pics from a rare moment when both combines were up on the Rock Pile.
Oops. Guess that was 6 pics. One more from the last set Roading to Hilltop. This was a bad idea. No more hi speed picture taking for me. If your picking up the military nature to these field names, it has a lot to do with the, apparently infamous, mountain men brothers were working for and the area of montana we were working in. I'll leave it at that, but will add that i wouldn't be surprised if KSSS knows who i'm talking about.
Welcome to the Hill Top Can't cut wheat anywhere without a fire. Atleast we didn't start this one 3 hour round trip with 2 trucks and 2 combines made for a lot free time for pictures I still don't understand how this happens, but it did and i untangled it every couple days Surprise the fires getting bigger.
Maybe the Rain will put it out for once The 2wd couldn't make it up the steep end of this draw. Only one thing left to do, sidehill it. These boys are from the part of KS that has sidehill combines. There aren't even any terraces, it can't be that steep.
I think the rain made it worse more waiting for trucks Yep. Definitely made it worse. This was another one of those bad ideas. Between the hill top we were cutting and the one the trucks we could get to was crazy farm road along a creek and then crossing that involved more boulders and a lot of mud. Then there was The Hill Top road. Dirt road cut out of the side of the hill that was pretty tame except the 100' chunk that was at least a 10% grade. I had been loading half on the trucks and then following them up and loading the other half, but i really wanted a good look at the fire. It took a running start, front and rear diff locks, dropping 8 gears and some skill/luck take your pick to make it up that 100' section and then i almost forgot to turn the diff locks back off for the next corner. I blame it on a lack of adult supervision.
Waiting for trucks. This was the G rated theme for our time in montana Maybe this rain storm will put out the fire. Statistically it has to happen at some point during the season. I mean, this is the third rainstorm of the day. oh that's not the Hill Top, that's just a saddle. There's a whole nother hill side to cut out. At least this part is down hill.
I'm not going up there. I don't care if you're light is one. I all ready got in one fight with a hill today and the wash doesn't look like any fun I can't remember why he cut that out the way he did, but he wanted to see how bad that wash was before he fully commited.
I know you guys want to see more fire pics. First time I've seen a water bomber. Pretty hard to catch from that far without any tele lens. Did a bit of croping just to prove theres one in these pics. The spotter plane is even harder to see. Speaking of hard to see. The bomber had a pretty hard time seeing it to. I was waiting for combines so i could do my thing and watching them fly around wondering how they can see each other when i can't see either one of them. Next thing i know the smoke shifts a little and i see both them headed right at one on another. The spotter plane preformed what i can only call evasive maneuvers with what from my perspective looked like inches to spare, but from my limited interaction with pilots, when a planes wings are in a vertical position ungood things are happening. Of course the other two guys were busy cutting wheat so this is a bit of an unconfirmed story.
More waiting for trucks. Good news is it isn't a 120 degrees and we've got some entertainment. Obligatory Sunset farming shots. this one was my desktop for awhile Sunset on the hills, that are still sorta on fire. Try cleaning up turn rows and other misc chunks of wheat. We do get paid to cut the whole thing. Everything looks cooler with lights. Awful lot of pics for one day i know, but it was busy/exciting day and i had a lot of free time on my hands and so did everybody else but the truckers. My trusty sidekick Trey even made a video of the haul road/crazy creek road, but it's not PG and i'm a bit hesitant to post it. With that it's way past my bedtime see ya'll bright and early.
Back at it again. This time in Blackwell, OK. Wheat in Altus and Ashland was all zeroed out by insurance. Several Bridges being worked on and no one on our 4 man skeleton crew having been this way before resulted in a lot of down town sight seeing and a very roundabout route to our target, the elevator in Billings, OK. You know it bad when you leave from northern kansas, drive around on all four sides of your destination, and pull into town from the south. After checking the settings on the 2 combines we brought down, we headed for the first field. I start roading mine to the field with another big guy in the buddy seat. And the A/C is doing nothing. Before we even make it 2 blocks we have the doors open and sweating something fierce. I mess around with it, resort to the telephone book sized manual, and proceed to call professional reinforcements, 2 hours out. Well the bossman isn't gonna let a combine sit for 2 hours when there's wheat to cut and a storm rolling in. And since combines are more something i work on than work he's gonna ride with me so i can't really balk at no A/C. To make things more interesting the seals for the reel in/out blew while he was hooking up the head, so the reel is all the way back in transport position. And then there was the vineweed. Never heard of it before yesterday, but it makes for some nasty combining. With reel only mildly functional, i was picking up a lot of vineweed to keep the wheat feeding onto the drapers. Spent most of my time trying not to plug the rotor and the engine hit 120% load more times than i really like to admit. If i'd been running a 7088 i'd still be out there digging out the rotor. After what felt like 5 hours, he took pity on me and sent me off to get the trucks. I would have gotten a picture of my boss running a brand new combine with the doors open, but after fighting vineweed, barely working reel and no A/C i was all too happy to do something else that involved air conditioning. We managed 2 truckloads before a storm built up right on top of us. The proharvest guy was from Washington state was thoroughly fascinated by his first midwest thunderstorm. He took a little too long to decide he had enough pictures and was soaked through before he made it to his truck. We headed for the highway, but before we even hit the elevator, it had stopped raining so we turned around and headed back for the full truck. Wasn't raining the whole 2 miles back to the field so Roddy hopped out and eased on in to town low and slow style. We make it half of the 2 miles back to the elevator before we hit another deluge with some hail added in for cringe factor. The elevator guys were nice enough to stand in the rain and unload the truck so we could drop trailer and send it back for my grain cart. Roddy is sitting Waterville with my cart and orders to not come back without a combine operator. For the one i have in mind I suggested a bottle of crown and some zip ties. Did i mention we're looking for help? Send me message if you're feeling adventurous.
You guys coming up to Eastern Idaho this year?
We'll be there the first week of August with at least 1 machine. It's been busy being short handed, but we've caught up.
Post #9; those are beautiful pictures, hvy!
I like the post #1 especially the picture of it. It's a great machine I think.