Life on the Farm

[Deerhunter21]

I gotta say BJ, you are getting Dang good at knapping! your arrows look great like always but the knapped heads with the art on the shaft makes your arrows look amazing!

[bjrogg]

Thank You Russell. I really appreciate that.

I just got home from a meeting.

We started this project 7 years ago. It’s a project that records our farm’s metrics. It grades us on things like carbon footprint, land use, environmental quality, water quality and stuff like that.

It’s been pretty interesting and our metrics are actually very good. I’m really not all that into the carbon footprint as much as I am the rest of the stuff, but the things we do to improve those metrics also improve our carbon footprint.

It’s a bit sad though. We’ve been doing these things for several years now. We did them at our expense. We had to learn all the lessons the hard way. Figure out what works for our farm and what doesn’t.

Now there’s new programs trying to encourage the methods we use. One would think we should have those same incentives, but we don’t qualify because we are already doing them.

I’m glad they are trying to get more operations to try these methods. I believe they are good for the soil, wildlife and environment. However it’s not fair providing my competition with a financial incentive for trying something I have been doing for years and not giving me the same incentive.

That’s the problem with so many programs. They really don’t have to make a whole lot of sense.

Bjrogg

[Buckskinner]

Planter is looking good!

We've lost frost in the ground here so I'm guessing tilling will start soon, not much put in the ground around here until about mid-April to avoid freezing temps.  Beets earlier? What is germination typical germination period?

[bjrogg]

Planter is looking good!

We've lost frost in the ground here so I'm guessing tilling will start soon, not much put in the ground around here until about mid-April to avoid freezing temps.  Beets earlier? What is germination typical germination period?

Yes beets are sometimes even planted early March around here.

We have to get most of the frost out of the ground, but we plant around some snow piles once in awhile along edges and by woods.

We need to get the ground dry enough though. Sometimes that happens early spring. Often we get a window before the rainy weather.

We have a lot of underground drainage tile.

Sugar beets are pretty cold hardy. They can take temps down to about 20 in the right growing stages. If they are just poking through the surface it can be hard on them.

They are actually easier to get a good stand planting early ahead of the spring rains than later when it’s getting drier and after our spring rains. We can’t plant them very deep, so it can be hard to keep them in the moisture to germinate.

We like to have them planted by my birthday April 16.

Bjrogg

I don’t think we will get any in March this year. Still pretty cold here and a lot of frost in the ground. Hopefully by my birthday

[bjrogg]

My son is gone to State FFA Convention and I’m feeding his cattle.

They are happy to see me.

[bjrogg]

It’s supposed to be turning warmer next week. We lost almost all of our snow yesterday and it froze good overnight. We decided to try and get as many acres of clover cover crop seed spread as we can today.

We have a gator and we can put our GPS on it. We also have a small spreader. Takes a lot of passes across the field but we can drive about 18 mph. With the gps we have a coverage map and acre counter. Also lines we drive by.

We are going to hit it pretty hard. Got up early and a few inches of fresh snow with more falling. We decided to keep going.

We do it like NASCAR one guy just drives. And another has bag open and dumps seed in.

Bjrogg

[bjrogg]

We did pretty good. Got 130 acres spread before the snow got warmer and started melting. That makes it drip water off the sides of spreader and it plugs the holes the seed comes out the bottom.

We had to quit and vacuum the seed back out of the spreader to clean the wet stuff on the bottom.

Sounds like it’s going to be to windy tomorrow. At least we got a start. About 25% done.

Bjrogg

[M2A]

18 mph! that's getting at it!

Frost was all out of the ground here and yesterday it was 55 degrees, This morning we got about 5 inches of snow and its still coming down.
Mike   

[bjrogg]

It is Mike. When we first started doing this we drove about 8 mph. We had trouble with the holes the seed flows through plunging a lot. We realized if we opened up the holes more they wouldn’t plug up as easily and we drove faster to put the right amount on. We do a pretty good job spreading it now. We put about 8 lbs a acre. Like everything else it’s getting more expensive. Seed price has doubled.


We got together and ground, mixed, stuffed and smoked 370lbs of pork sausage. Tradition.

This stuff is yummy

Bjrogg

[bjrogg]

Everybody gets some

[bjrogg]

Got the pork sausage vacuum packed and put away yesterday.

Got up early this morning and spread clover. It went really good.

I had almost 60 acres before the sun peaked out.

[bjrogg]

Hard to tell where the sky begins and the water ends. This is why we call it the sunrise side.

The sun didn’t stay out for long though. Which was good for my job. I went from 3:00am to 3:00 pm. It’s getting to sloppy now. I did finish 3 farms and about 205 acres.

I hope I can get the rest soon, but it sounds like it could take awhile. Nothing below freezing in the forecast this week

Bjrogg

[bjrogg]

The Canadian Geese love grazing on my winter white wheat. There will literally be thousands of them here.

Bjrogg

[Pappy]

Looks like you are having a busy winter.
 Pappy

[Buckskinner]

The Canadian Geese love grazing on my winter white wheat. There will literally be thousands of them here.

Bjrogg

Free fertilizer!