September 11, 2017

View of the day-Looks like someone let the air out of these bins...or they are very tired.

This happened a couple weeks ago at Marilyn's sisters place at Carlyle. Three of the same bins in a row and as the trucker was loading out of the middle one, it laid over and took the last one with it. The hopper cones were bolted to the cement pads and hung on for dear life, but the top part of them didn't fair so well. They both had grain in them, but it had been cleaned up with the grain vac in this picture.

Well there has been a certain amount of feedback about the blog "slowdown". This harvest has been like none other in our harvest career. The fact that we can start combining before 9am and run until 11pm...or even later if there were trucks...is unheard of for this length of time. This was where the slowdown came in...we were doing exactly the same thing every day and the view was exactly the same every day. We could have almost "cut and pasted" every day for a new blog. Marilyn don't roll like that.

This past weekend was Marilyn's to work at Staples back in Yorkton. She went up on Friday to get a few errands done...the camper had water issues and some new fittings were in order. She had an early shift on Saturday, then a script selection meeting in the evening for the annual Christmas dinner theatre.

While she was slaving away at Staples, Al was working with the rest of the crew to get the last field finished for our farmers. They wrapped up around 6pm and had supper brought in by Al's brother Jeff who is the Pioneer seed salesman.

With our main job done, Al did a bit of calling around to see if anyone else needed a harvester. The farmer we had lined up back in the spring and had visited with a few weeks ago, figured that since things were going so well, they would be able to finish on their own. Another neighbor that this farmer had borrowed a grain bagger from had a combine break down, so he called a couple guys in to help...Al was back in business. Marilyn was pulling the Sunday shift back at Staples.

Now, Marilyn got the short end of the stick while she was gone. Friday, the crew had supper in the field, brought out by the other crew that we were working with. Saturday, Jeff brought a chicken feed down from Moosomin, and Sunday, the farmer brought out pizzas from Kipling for the crew.

Marilyn got back to the camper late on Sunday, since she decided to attend the staff barbecue and awards supper held out at JC Beach in Yorkton. She received the "Swiss army knife" award for being able to fix anything, with anything that is handy.

Monday, there was only a little bit left for the farmer, since he had both his downed combines back in service. Marilyn gave Al a ride out in the morning so there wouldn't be and extra vehicle when he drove the combine back after finishing. 


Marilyn had missed out on the "grain bagging" experience last time, since she was working in Yorkton. She almost missed it again, but managed to see a bag get started. This picture has a completed bag on the left and the new bag ready to get started on the right.

As the grain cart loads into the small hopper, it is sent to the back of the bag. The tractor that is on the bagger itself, is running in neutral and as the bag fills, the grain "pushes" the tractor ahead. Pretty neat to watch. 

The problem with this storage, according to the farmer, is the wildlife. Over the winter, the birds like to peck at it and the deer find it irresistible to walk on with their pointy hooves. Otherwise it is great temporary storage.

Marilyn had gone into Kipling to look for those elusive plumbing parts for the bypass valve that was leaking in the storage compartment in the camper. There had been no luck in Yorkton on the weekend, so she tried Home Hardware. She got the parts back to the camper...the hose was not a common size...just enough bigger than 1/2" that they wouldn't work.

Next, she drove down to Carlyle to the RV place. They fixed her up with a valve that should work, so she went back to the camper. This one didn't work either. By this time, Al was finished combining and had moved the combine back to the shop trailer in the yard, so he got to go for a ride...back to Carlyle to try again. This time we got the right one, and the water problem had been solved.

So. At this point, it would appear that we are finished for the season. That is too bizarre. We just started August 8...but considering the weather and grain conditions...it was a crazy fast run. We ended up doing just under 3000 acres!

Tomorrow we clean off the combine and headers, do a bit of fixing, then try to get our new header trailer set up to actually hold the header without hitting any brackets or wheels. Wednesday, our hauler will be taking the combine back to Yorkton and we will take the camper home.

We're not washing it off just yet...with the forecast of rain and seeing all the crop that is still out around the Yorkton area, we might be making dust, yet again...

Call us if you need some help...