Harvest Wrap-Up

We started harvesting wheat on June 18, we finally finished on July 12. Under normal conditions our wheat harvest takes about 10 days. However this year there was very little that was normal about wheat harvest. 

The wheat this year endured colder than usual temperatures this winter, a drought in the spring and then inches of rain in the middle of harvest. All that resulted in some of our fields looking this:

 Depending on when fields were sprayed for weeds and several other factors some fields looked normal, nice golden wheat waving in the breeze. But the last couple days of harvest my dad was combining just as many weeds as he was wheat.

   The boys and I took turns riding with Grandpa while he wrapped up the last few acres of harvest. There's a rhythm to harvest that simply didn't exist this year, or maybe it did back on June 18 or 19 and then it got all messed up with the weather.

 One farmer told Ben, "I don't want to hear the "w" word until September. This has been a summer from hell." I doubt he's the only farmer that feels that way.
I was relieved when Ben remembered to get me a bucket of wheat! I was completely forgetting that I needed more so I can keep grinding it to use when I bake bread. He climbed up in the truck for me to snatch a bucketful.

Ben spent a good chunk of his week planting double crop beans and forage sorghum. Planting brings new hope....and the possibility of new crop disasters. But we'll continue to hope and pray and watch the corn and beans grow.