We put up corn silage in the last few day. Filled up the silo to the top. The corn looked pretty good, better than I expected. I could just stay ahead unloading while the chief hauled and Roger ran the. chopper. The fox continued it's corn eating tradition. It busted up some gathering chains but those didn't set us back very long. Looks like good feed with more corn than last year.
Took a trip to Dawson Creek a little over a week ago to conduct some investigations. Got to see some wheat, pea, and canola harvest going on while working. They are experiencing above average moisture this year so have had a pretty good hay crop. Saw many cow calf operations, mostly red and white colored with a few blacks, and one good sized feed lot.
The big education I received was what was happening in the "Oil patch"of the Canadian natural gas deposits and oil sands. Imagine small towns exploding in size, new industrial buildings for fracing, oil fields services, site cleanup and drilling. New hotels and restaurants built in just a couple years. Imagine every hotel parking lot with 7 fully equipped pickup and large industrial trucks for every 1 car packed full everynight and large truck traffic going 24/7 in all directions. Imagine a huge population of hardworking men, many in their 20s with minimal skill sets making close to six figure salaries, it is a modern day gold rush. Well you don't have to imagine it just go there and see it, the dollars involved are staggering. It made me appreciate our Midwest ethanol industry and want to encourage my neighbors to support it. Ethanol is and will continue to be a key to the economic vitality of our small communities in Iowa. It won't be pretty to see these northern Canadian town if the resources run out and it makes me wonder about my local communities if ethanol takes a dive.
Local sweet corn tycoon Kerns Corn had some extra older ears last week so we filled up a trailer full. It was kind of a pay back he said for me helping out with some picking a few weeks back. Don't tell him but I had always wanted to pick with the big boys so no compensation was needed. Well this old corn was a big treat for the stockers.... and we had 2 calves born within days of starting to feed, must be good stuff.
Mr. Kerns grows good corn so stop by his selling locations to pick up some of his bicolor goodness or if you see a truck flying down the road with a trailer full of corn and Hawkeye licences plates that say EATCORN flag him down to get some.
I suppose if you are good at vacuuming you can always find work. This guys should at least be able to feed himself later in life. I think we should keep pushing the arithmetic lessons though.
95+ degrees.... humid.... no clouds... no breeze.... tongues hanging out.... so we provided some relief to these guys with a sprinkler.
This seven year old was a big help loading 3rd crop alfalfa round bales last week. We went out a 7 am to finish up hauling. He could just reach the pedals to follow me in the loader, saved a lot of time.
Like fat guys at a buffet. Those 2 beneficial bugs in the lower right can't eat all those aphids.
