Selfie

Taken after wacking weeds, ahead of tomorrow's rain, in the garden. Hot and humid, I feel a lot stickier than I look.

Oats and Clover vs. Rocks and Weeds

The results are in...

This little tractor...

Near the end of July my 65 acres of oats (underseeded with red clover) were looking good, at least I thought they were. There was a fair amount of foxtail mixed into portions of my fields.  I thought I could deal with them by running them through the combine (wrongly, as it turns out).  We had some heavy storms and approximately 90% of the oats "lodged", or fell on the ground. This makes it very difficult to pick up with the combine, especially since I had 12" or so of red clover beneath the oats. I also knew that I had rocks left in the field, this past spring I didn't get them all, and they ruin machinery. 

This meant we wouldn't be harvesting any oats. Which itself was problematic as the local elevator stopped accepting oats a month ago (an unprecedented act according to locals). Oats no longer have feed value - modern animal rations based on corn/soybeans promote faster weigh gain, hence profitability. There is no room for a second place finisher. Put that bit of knowledge up against the insistence by the soil preservation and university researchers who say that you should add a small grain (e.g. oats) to your crop rotation. Well, what to do with the oats?

Prior to the decision to stop taking oats, grain buyers were paying just about the out of pocket cost of production for them. If, and it's a big if, you can get the "test weight", or density, high enough, the oats can qualify as "food grade" and there's a slight premium paid for that. But you need to store them after you harvest them, you can't just truck them directly to the buyer. I don't have storage bins.  The farmstead near my 65 acres has 2 old ones, which I contacted the owner about renting.  He was open to it if I needed them (if my oats were dense enough). That said, I'd have to pay to store them and hope that no mold appeared. I'd augur them out of the combine/grain truck and into the bins. Then when I sold them in 6 months, I'd augur them into a truck. A lot of this had to go right to get  a couple thousand dollars.  But everything didn't go right.

The reason I grew oats was to provide a "nurse crop" for the clover, and then after harvesting the grain, the roots/stems decay into the soil to build up it's organic matter. Both oats and clover would crowd out weeds, and if they couldn't, we'd "harvest" the weeds along with the oats. The clover would remain after the oats were harvested and continue to fix nitrogen for the following 2 years. Then I can plow it under and plant corn, hopefully without having to add too much (expensive) fertilizer -- I spent $4000 on composted chicken manure this year.  That year of corn (2018) will be my first organic harvest.  That is why I need to get rid of weeds and build fertility. And get rid of rocks that bust up metal blades.

With no oats to combine - and too many weeds even if the oats hadn't lodged (green material clogs the augurs in the combine, you need dry seeds so everything flows) - I decided to mow the 65 acres with a five foot wide Bush hog. There was too much foxtail to make hay and too many rocks that would destroy the hay making equipment.

The short green leaves are red clover. The brown are oat stems/hulls. The taller green plants are foxtail.

Foxtail has very tough stems, forcing me to drive slowly through them in order to cut them all off.

For a long time I couldn't figure out why I had these wispy strands after I mowed. The blades were dull! I had to buy a cordless grinder - no power in the field - to sharpen them up.

There's a church and cemetery in the corner of my land.

This is one of the larger rocks. I could feel the tires bump over them and I'd stop and get out. Many rows I'd have the floor of the tractor full of rocks. At the end of the row I'd throw them in the fence line next to a tree.

It took me seven days to mow the 65 acres. I think I mowed down all the foxtail before the seed heads were viable, we'll see.  If not, I might have to do it again to knock it back. Foxtail also does well in compacted, poorly drained soil. The previous farmer ran his equipment through the low areas when they were wet, probably so he could get the crops off, and left large ruts. This is one possible cause of the compaction. Also, I might add a drain tile to one of the wetter areas to remove excess water.  I'll probably leave the clover intact all next year, mowing the weeds if they come up. That should help build up soil organic matter which is said to reduce preexisting compaction.

Spending so much time on the tractor going 2-3 mph gives you time to look at the weeds, among other things.  I saw, in order of decreasing frequency - foxtail, ragweed, lambs quarter, giant foxtail, bull thistle, canadian thistle, giant ragweed, burdock.  To give you some idea, by volume of plant matter over the 65 acres, I'd say there was roughly 50% clover, 25% oats, 20% foxtail, 4% ragweed, 1% of the remaining weeds.

Bottom line - I'm happy with how things are shaping up. Tired but happy. I have a solid stand of red clover, one that should stay viable for 2 years, with a lot of chopped up green and brown material to feed the bugs/microbes/worms. The possibility of a new stand of oats coming up this fall. The hope that I've put a big dent in my weed "seed bank", thus making my future a little brighter.

You know, this could actually work!

Out and About

Late this afternoon I opened the doors to the corn crib coops and let out the birds.

Fun to watch.

As dusk approached I put some vegetable trimmings inside the coop and they climbed back in for the night. Tomorrow, weather permitting, I'll leave them out a little longer. Ultimately they'll spend all their days out of the coop. Or at least the doors will be open.

Poultry in the Corn Cribs

I converted the two old corn cribs into chicken/poultry coops.

I wanted to reuse the structures. They are still strong and have concrete floors, good for keeping predators from tunneling into them.

To start I put up two roofs, positioned to deflect the prevailing westerly winds. The challenge was to build the whole thing from below - framing, plywood, and waterproof membrane.  An angled plane through a cylinder (aka a corn crib) is an ellipse.  So I laid out one of the proper size on plywood using a string, sharpie, and 3 screws.

Then welded up some angled metal brackets to bolt onto the corn crib frame.  Set built up beams into the brackets and laid rafters on the beams.

Put the cut out plywood and waterproof tarps on top of the beams. Cut a passage way between the two corn cribs. Lined the whole thing with 1/2" hardware cloth to keep out weasels (apparently they can squeeze through a hole the size of a quarter.) Built and installed doors, water piping, roosting bars, nesting boxes.

Time to move the roughly 40 birds from their brooders over to the new housing.  There are 25 guinea fowl (about 4 weeks old) as well as 10 laying hens, a rooster, 2 geese, 2 turkeys, and 2 ducks (all 2 months old).

They'll spend the next two weeks in the cribs day and night, getting used to the idea of their new home. Then I'll open the doors during the day and let them back in at night, where they'll be secure from predators.  At this point I'm planning on killing/eating the geese and ducks. If it turns out I have a male/female pair of turkeys, I'll keep them over the winter and hope they have poults in the spring. The guinea are meant to eat ticks; the laying hens to lay eggs.

To winterize them, I'll still need to wrap up the outside of the cribs with a few more tarps.

Reunion

Several of us went down to Grass Creek, IN this past weekend for a family reunion.

Listening to the stories told by my aunts and uncles was priceless. When I came back I found this on the Practical Farmer's of Iowa blog and wanted to share it here. There are some parallels between his history and our family's.

We shall not cease from exploration,
and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started
and know the place for the first time.
–T.S. Eliot

...............

My cousin Tristan took a lot of great pics (link). Here's one of my Dad, on the right, and his brother Roger and sisters Sandra and Shirley.

My aunt Shirley gave me this high school graduation photo of her brother, my uncle, John. He died around 2002.

 All the kids of the generation in the top photo who made it to the reunion.

.................

I took the farm trailer down to Indiana so I could bring back a six row cultivator - pulled behind a tractor, it digs up all the weeds in between the rows of crops - that my uncle Roger hadn't used in decades, ever since herbicides became popular. While spraying sure is a lot easier it's not allowed under the organic production rules so I needed a cultivator up here in Turtle Lake.

My cousin Darrell used Roger's loader to put the cultivator on the trailer.

Then we strapped it down with chains for the 500+ miles back to Turtle Lake.

To get it off the trailer Dad and I took it up to the nearby John Deere dealer where they picked it up with a big fork lift and set it on the ground. There was still a bit more to do as two of the connecting pins needed to attach it to the back of the tractor were rusted in place. After a mechanic used a torch to break the rusted parts free, we hooked it up to the tractor and brought it back to the farm.

It has a place of honor on the old barn foundation. Prime location!

Next year Darrell and I, along with anyone else who wants to help, will be coordinating the Reunion. Hope to see you there!

Black Raspberries

There's a big patch in the yard. We've been eating them for the last ten days or so. On pancakes, oatmeal and ice cream. Or just straight off the vine.

Chicken Killing Time

I guess the preferred euphemism is "processing".

The 15 Cornish X hens came to the end of their lives this past week. I'd been keeping them in a mobile pasture pen, also known as a chicken tractor.

My nephew Calvin came to the farm with my parents and we processed the first two -- then ate them at our 4th of July bar-b-que.

Take it away Calvin -

Three days ago, another nephew, Max was here with my dad and we killed/cleaned the rest.

-------------------

Look out below! Blood and guts to follow ---