June 14, 2011

View of the day-It’s that time again…cleaning for the move. Good thing there is a large front yard at our campground.

We got right down to business rounding up the equipment that was scattered around the countryside. Marilyn took Al out south to pick up the tractor and cart to bring them back to the trailers so we could load up. Marilyn went back to the camper and started blowing off the combine and header…not a fun job with a couple of rains packing down the chaff on the feederhouse.

When Al got back, he fuelled up the Freightliner then we loaded the pickup head on it’s trailer…we still hadn’t decided which trailer it was going to get pulled behind. With the header off the combine, we went out to John’s farm to get the MacDon head out of transport and loaded onto the high speed trailer for the long haul, then brought the header into town and parked in on the street for a quick getaway in the morning.

Back at the camper, Al had to replace another shock on the General before cleaning and fueling it up. We went over to the trailers and got the tractor and cart loaded and locked down, then hooked the header trailer up behind it and moved it onto the street. Unfortunately, we had light issues…even though we had everything working when it was hooked up to the pickup, but now we didn’t have brake lights. We worked on them for about an hour and discovered the trailer had some kind of messed up, hook up, so we gave up and put a new signal light on the General instead.

We went over and got the combine loaded and hooked up before calling it a day and heading to Pizza Hut to dine. Al wants AIS by 7am, so if Marilyn wants eggs she will have to see the sunrise to be ready. We will get one load up to the farm at Timken, then come right back to Cherokee.

We have to be back in time for the final hockey game of the Stanley Cup…

June 13, 2011

View of the day-One of two coyotes that kept getting scooted along as Marilyn finished the canola. They didn’t look too good in the 104º heat…mangy to…and not too smart because for every swath they moved to the north, three bunnies would come out of the swath the combine was on.

Al had to get up extra early to go our farmers place to settle up and since it was going to be a cooker again, we were pretty sure the canola was going to be good to combine…but just to be on the safe side, we waited until after lunch to start in.

We got going around 1:30pm and with the exception of a drive belt that jumped off the pickup head, we were able to get the last 50 acres lapped up. Marilyn drove the combine back to the camper and once Al had gotten the truck unloaded, he came back with the pickup and we went back for the General.

So that is it for combining in Oklahoma, now we get to load up and figure out how everything is going to get moved in two trips.

It was still 103º at 8pm and tomorrow is cleaning day…a cooling trend with highs of only 95º…

June 12, 2011

View of the day-Al checks out the tanks at the veteran’s memorial near Helena, OK.

Last night as we sat out front of the library sending up the blog and surfing around, the skies were flashing with lightning. We saw a few drops hitting the windshield and decided we had better get back to the camper before it was too late. We nicely got the door open on the camper and it hit…boy did it hit…the wind was blowing hard and it started pouring.

We were okay in the camper, the house we are parked beside made an excellent buffer against the wind and no leaks from the driving rain. It carried on for a couple of hours and in the end we had almost an inch here in town, with no signs of damage that we could see.

We had taken a drive out to John’s farm where he had taken the draper head that was in transport mode. Something curious had happened from the wind that had hit on Thursday…somehow, the wind had blown the header in such a way that the tongue hitch swung around 180º and was straight under the header pointing backwards. Aliens??

We knew we wouldn’t be combining today, so we made arrangements to settle up with Ron in Enid, get a bit of shopping done and give the Chinese buffet a workout. Marilyn got her Walmart fix in and Al was able to get a couple of things from Atwoods that he had on his list. We had supper and a good visit with our farmers, then stopped for groceries on the way out of town and it was late when we finally got back to the camper and unloaded everything.

Tomorrow the heat is back on so we hope to get that last 50 acres of canola lapped up…

June 11, 2011

View of the day-The hammer is down on the last field of canola, before the storms hit.

Al was up early to get the load of canola over to Dacoma, then back to the field to dump what was left of the field on the cart. He left the General out at the field by Alva and got a ride back to the camper with the farmer. We went out to the field to get the combine and Al drove it over to the field while Marilyn stopped back at the camper to pick up the new part for the combine that ProHarvest had dropped off…talk about service!

Out at the field, Marilyn got started with the outside rounds. The field looked flat as a table, which would be a nice treat after picking up swaths on the terraces of the last few fields. Looks can be deceiving. Carving through the middle of the field was a waterway canyon that ‘y’ed off in two directions…well, perhaps not a canyon, maybe gorge would be a better description.

We had been hearing reports of bad weather possibly popping up during the afternoon but most of it seemed to be going around us. Our luck didn’t hold out because right after Marilyn had given the farmer’s mother a ride around the field, the rain started. It wasn’t a gully-washer like the one that hit us a few days ago, but it was enough to shut us down.

Al had enough for a load, so Marilyn rode in to the elevator with him while we unloaded, then we hogged up the parking lot with the grain truck and had supper at McDonalds. We went back out to the field and by the time we got out there, the sun was shining so Marilyn went out and did a test…good to go again. We got another 20 acres done before the sprinkles started again, so we quit for good and went back to the camper.

There are all kinds of storm warnings out…tornadoes to the far west of us, hopefully not coming our way…or anyone’s way, for that matter.

And Marilyn was twice by Walmart today without going in…

June 10, 2011

View of the day-This poor spider had his work cut out as it made its web while Marilyn was combining. The wind never broke the web, even though it was spanning 3ft between the mirror bar and the hand rail. The bonus for the spider was that the lights were attracting all kinds of flying insects that didn’t have a chance.

We got to sleep in a bit because of the rain shower from last night. We did a bit of surfing at the library…Al had to get caught up with the blog since he had not read it for a few days. We had lunch and after that Marilyn headed out service and do a sample.

Al had the General in town from the night before so he had his own wheels and waited to hear from Marilyn if the canola was dry. He got the call that it was good to go so he headed out to the field. It had finally cooled down a bit…if you can call 90º cooler. Things were going good until Al got a call from Marilyn on the radio that she had no hydraulics…and she had to be in the farthest corner of the field.

Well after looking things over Marilyn found that a rod that holds the tightener pulley on the hydraulic pump had broken and the belt that runs the pump had jumped off the pulley. A quick call to the CaseIH dealer in Fairview only to find out they don’t have one. The ProHarvest truck in Pratt, KS did, but that was 90 miles away. We made a quick call to Butch back at Butler Welding and after a trip into Cherokee, he got us fixed up and going in no time.

After that, things were pretty uneventful…Al hauled in a few more loads to Dacoma and he took the General with the last load of the night in to the camper to catch the last few minutes of the hockey game.

Meanwhile, Marilyn finished the field and dumped the remaining canola in the cart for Al to haul in tomorrow. We will have to move about 25 milesto our last field of canola and if the rain holds off we just might finish it.

And the weekend is here again…

June 9, 2011

View of the day-Al picking up canola in the wind, yet again.

Al was up early to take his load of canola to Alva, then he went out to the field, serviced the combine and started on the canola. Marilyn came out later to take over and finish off the rest of the field.

We moved a mile down the road and started in on another quarter of canola…odd how this one is running almost 25bu/ac and it is just down the road from the last field that went around13bu/ac. Productivity was down a bit on this one as there were some ‘window-kissing’ terraces to work up and down…shut up and drive.

We had been listening to the weather band all day and the forecast was for more bad weather but we had high hopes that it would miss us. Al had taken the first load into the elevator at Dakoma which was a few miles closer than Alva, but still a jaunt. He jumped in and combined until he had a cart load, then waited while Marilyn made another round to top off the truck. While at the north end of the field, Al mentioned that there were some rain drops hitting his window on the tractor but Marilyn doesn’t quit until it is running off the header, so she was able to get enough to fill the truck…even though the wiper had to be used a couple of times.

More warnings were coming on the radio and Al was off to Dacoma again, with reports back that the highway was wet…and news on the weather band that Cherokee had two inch hail…ouch. Al called back to say he had hit a wall of rain and if Marilyn was near the south end of the field, perhaps she should bail out. She did just that as the rain and wind started, but she still had to tarp the grain cart after she unloaded the combine. She got that job done just in the nick of time and after driving the combine over to the pick-up, raced out to the highway as it let loose and just poured.

Back in Cherokee, she waited for Al to get back to town and swung by the camper to see if the hail did any damage…no signs of it anywhere. Once Al got back to the camper,we went to Miss Dotties and while we were sitting ther, the skies opened up again, with hail…pea size…and lots of rain. This should make the farmers happy to finally get some of the wet stuff.

Not so good for combiners, though…

June 8, 2011

View of the day-Repair job complete.
Al was up at the crack of dawn and on his way to Pratt to pick up the coupler that we needed to fix the header. Marilyn stayed back at the camper and got things ready to go once we were able to get started back in the field.

Al was able to stop for coffee with Lee Petersen, a fellow Canadian harvester who had just moved up to Pratt. Lee was on his way back to Canada to do some more seeding while his crew waited on some wheat around Pratt. Once Al got the part he was back in Cherokee by 10:30 and they went to work getting everything back together.

There was a bit of tweaking to do to get things lined up properly, but before long they had it assembled and tested for quality assurance so we were good to go. Al moved the combine out to the field and rode around for a couple of rounds to make sure everything was going to work as it should. Franklin, one of the farmers showed up and helped Al move the cart and pickup to the next field about 7 miles SE of where we were.

Marilyn got the field finished, then Al took the load to Alva while she moved to the next field and started in on it. It was another 106º day with a brutal south wind…again…that made picking up the swaths going north quite the task once the sun went down…you could hardly see the swath in the white out from the dust and chaff.

There were weather warnings to the north of us as the clouds moved in just before sunset and by the time we quit the lightning was flashing. Just as we parked the combine to fuel it, the wind switched to come out of the north and by the time we got back to Cherokee, the nasty stuff had moved NE leaving us unscathed.

The header worked like a charm on the 120 acres we did today…