Sunday, September 28th...

Harvest continues to roll on.  After the heavy rains from early September soaked in we were able to get back into the fields on the 17th.  Since then we have been covering acres harvesting corn. Yields are still excellent. Our soybeans are maturing so we will be making the switch over to the platform head very soon. The recent warm temperatures of our Indian Summer have dried corn quickly in the fields and we are now harvesting 16-18% moisture corn with the occasional later maturity hybrid still holding at 20% moisture. We plan to begin our tillage, lime and fertilizer operations this week as well. All our man power of recent has been used to haul wet corn into our dryer site and then haul dry corn back out to our local grain bins or various elevators.  

While we were waiting for the soils to dry and corn to drop in moisture content, we harvested our 20" corn plot. The highest yielding entry made 281 bpa with a plot average of 257 bpa. We were pleased, but hopeful we might have an entry break the 300 bpa ceiling. We also harvested our 20" row vs. 30" row comparison which was planted adjacent to the big hybrid plot. The populations were 36,000 ppa for the 30" rows and 40,000 ppa for the 20" rows. The end result was a 24.3 bu advantage to the 20" rows.  While we are happy to see these results, we plan to replicate this test again next year.  

Unloading the combine "on the go" on the Davin field

Weighing an entry from our plot

Unloading another truck load of corn at our dryer site

Tom operating the combine as it comes to the end of the field

The grain cart unloading into a semi at sunset

Grandpa Tom and Max getting ready to take a combine ride after lunch

Owen wrapping up the baseball season with his Tigers team