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View of the day-The combine is loaded and ready to hit the road.
Al was on the road early with the General to go pick up the combine trailer where we had left it near Kipling. Marilyn had to wait for the trucker to show up for the combine, so they could start for the field near Saltcoats.
Al got the trailer parked where he had planned on our field near Rokeby, then went up to our yard to empty all the "stuff" that had been loaded in the back of the General. Once he had all that done and the truck fueled up, he started back to the field to meet us.
It was raining pretty good at Carlyle while the combine was getting loaded. The driver got it done and with Marilyn and here flashing light to lead the way, we hit the road. Fortunately, we ran out of the rain just north of the Moose Mountain park...and we even managed to see a cow moose in the ditch that was thinking about trying to get across the road. A good blast on the air horn sent here back into the bush.
We made it out to the field, just as Al was coming down the road from the north. They got the combine unloaded and we parked it in the bin yard, then headed back to Carlyle.
We were planning on staying one more night in Carlyle, but because we had made such good time...even considering the 45 minute wait for road construction...we decided to pull up stakes and go back to Yorkton. It didn't take long to get everything put away and hooked up...Al had brought the 1/2 ton to pull the shop trailer back, so we each had our own ride.
We got back to our yard around 10pm, pulled the camper up on the lawn, grabbed what we needed in the house and called it a night. We could see that SaskEnergy had trenched a line across our front yard...they had to move a couple of things to get through. They cut through the power lines to our front pillars and didn't hook them back up.
Someone is getting a call tomorrow...
View of the day-Getting the last of the beans dumped in the bin means Kim and Marg's harvest is done.
We got out to the field and started combining just after 10am and with Kim working on one "island" and Marilyn on the other, we were finished in an hour and on our way back to the yard.
Marilyn started blowing off the header and we got it loaded on the high speed transport trailer. After getting the rotor compartment blown out, we pulled the two concaves we had taken the wires out of.
Since there were no more beans on the horizon, we had to replace the wires we had pulled, fortunately Marilyn had numbered them in the order they came out...the hope was that they would go back "home" easier. Al would hold them with the vice grips and pound the grips with the hammer, 10 inches at a time...for 28 wires.
It actually only took us 45 minutes to get all the wires back in. After getting the concaves back in the combine, we hooked the header trailer up and headed north.
We had gotten a call a while back from a former farmer we had harvested for who was looking for some help around the Saltcoats/Bredenbury area. This is about 30 miles SE of our place at Yorkton, so the move will get us closer to home. First we had to find the field.
After a few texts and a phone call, we managed to find the bin site and a spot in the field to leave the straight header. There is straight wheat and some canola to pick up, so both headers will be needed.
We went back to Carlyle after grabbing a snack in Esterhazy. Tomorrow we have more moving in store...Al is taking the General back to Kipling to get the combine trailer and take it back to the farm to park it for the winter.
Marilyn is going to be the pilot vehicle for the Kardynal Transport truck that is coming down to take the combine up to Saltcoats. We decided not to take the duals off and our trailer won't handle the load...Al is leery about hauling the extra wide load on it.
A slight chance of rain tomorrow, so it should be interesting...
View of the day-Al gets to start combining in the beans today.
Al and Kim got rolling by 10:30am, while Marilyn got to make a parts run to Redvers. Because we are cutting right on the ground, the rocks are wreaking havoc on the knife sections, so a couple of boxes were in order.
Imagine, in farming country, a town the size of Carlyle (pop approx. 1440) and there is no place that carries these things.
Marilyn took over combining and Al did the hauling for the afternoon. We quit just after sundown, with about 40 acres to go. Those acres are on two "islands" that are cut off by water runs and we don't want to be navigating that in the dark.
Last of the beans tomorrow...
View of the day-Gordie got the ladder fixed. Window and air filter cleaning will be a lot easier now. He had to cut them off at the bend, then weld them back together again and paint them. Let's hope we don't get stuck and bend it again.
Today we got the chaff and straw blown off the combine, so we wouldn't get dusted out too bad when we took the concaves out. With a good wind blowing, we opened up all the shields and blew out all the dust that had been hiding in the guts of the combine. Once the coast was clear, we pulled out the middle of the three concaves and started pulling wires.
This is the middle concave with the wires as they should be...considered a "small wire" concave. This one works fine for small grains, but since we were going to be moving on to soybeans, the spaces had to be wider. We did...or do...have a set of wide wire concaves from back at home, but when Al went to find them when he was home for the hockey game, they had "disappeared". So we had to do it the old way...pull every second wire.
We got that done without too many problems. Marilyn made a point of numbering them all, so when we have to put them back in, it will go a lot smoother...we hope.
Once we got that one finished, we took the front concave out. It has an extra collar on it and there are "disrupter" bars, that fill in the gaps to make more threshing area. This picture shows the wires pulled on half of the concave...and Al's hammer.
We finally had the wires pulled and the concaves back in the combine. This picture shows the difference between the front two concaves on the left, and the third one. It was now time to get it set for soybeans, then go out and do a test. Kim got his combine cleaned off and ready...he had different concaves and didn't have to do any pulling, so he was ready in no time.
We moved over to the bean field a few miles east, then got the header into "flex" mode. W haven't combined soybeans for several years now and not since we have been running the MacDon header, so we were eager to see how it would work. First we had to get the manual out to see if we had done everything right.
Kim was working with his Honeybee header, which was a draper, similar to ours, but it was not a flex draper. He had never combined beans, so had no idea of what to expect. It didn't take long before he had it "sort of" figured out and we were both making dust.
Were we ever making dust. With what ever wind was blowing and the combination of bean dust and road dust along the outside rounds, it was almost impossible to see where we were going. As you can see...or not see...from this view out the combine window. Al was doing the combining and Marilyn was co-piloting. That job included going out to take the rocks off the header that had been picked up from running the header on the ground.
As the evening wore on and the wind died down, the dust was just creeping low across the field.
We got the semi loaded, then headed back for the farm. We thought we would celebrate the first of the beans, with a Blizzard from Dairy Queen, so we went home through town. They were closed for Thanksgiving. Curses. Leftover pumpkin pie filled the gap.
And, of course, another beauty of a sunset...
View of the day-The buggy man was kept busy today in the barley.
We were out in the field, ready for action by 10:30am. It had been a warm night, dry morning and the day was promising to be just as gorgeous as yesterday.
All machines were running...as was Kim, doing the trucking. Gordie had taken over in Kim's combine, so Al was relegated to cart duty...once he returned from Yorkton. He got back around noon and spent the rest of the afternoon chasing across the field dumping the combines.
The cart was just one size too small for three combines, so we weren't always able to get the whole hopper unloaded, just so none of us had to stop and wait. Kim helped out a bit by chancing a drive out into the soft field to pick up the overflow...and you could always tell where he had been by the tracks he left. No one got stuck, though.
We finished the barley around 4:30pm and moved everything back to the yard. It is Thanksgiving in Canada this long weekend, so Marg cooked all weekend to make supper for us. And we all ate WAYYYY too much.
But at least the barley is done...
View of the day-Crossing the waterway to get to to the last of Kim's wheat...no one got stuck.
We had a 10 acre patch to finish off for Kim then we were ready to swap headers for some pickup work. After a quick lunch back at the yard we headed across the road to the last of Bob's wheat.
Bob had his combine fixed in no time thanks to the guys from Redvers, so there were three machines running on the little bit he had left. Once we finished that, we fueled up in the yard and got things set up to combine some barley...Al's favorite...heavy sarcasm there.
All three machines got rolling in the barley and the conditions were perfect. The weather has really turned around, which has helped a lot and we had a good wind to keep drying the crop.
Al had previously booked the evening off so he could head north to watch his Terriers in the second game of the Highway 10 battle with the Melville Millionaires. Unfortunately, they lost both games, but the season has just started, so they will get them back in the next battle.
We got a picture sent from our little patch of land 5 miles from Yorkton, near Rokeby. We have someone else custom farming it, which includes the harvesting. What's new...the harvester never seems to get to harvest his own crop. This is the first crop we have put in the bin that we had put up several years ago.
More barley for tomorrow...
View of the day-A gorgeous day with...sundogs? Say it isn't so...that usually means cold weather is on the way. At least it means that in January, but that's relative, isn't it.
Even though the dew was heavy, we rushed it a bit and got started by 11am. Kim started combining to see where the wet spots might be...nothing to serious to deal with, so we were off and running. After the first hopper, Al took over combining for the rest of the day.
This field is cut up into several pieces by the water runs that go through it, so we had to find the driest of the wet spots to cross. Fortunately, we had the cart, so it wasn't a worry since it had to do all the crossing.
We finished the really low section of the field and moved over to the last chunk right along side the #9 highway. Everything was going smoothly until Marilyn lost a section knife right in the middle of the header and it was stripping, so time off to fix.
While Marilyn did her fixing, Al kept combining so we could get this field finished.
We figured this would be the last of the wheat that Kim had, but then he got a call from his dad that his combine had a breakdown and wouldn't be fixed for a couple days...no word on the break...but we would have about 70 acres of pickup work right across the road from Kim's yard.
We finished around 5:30pm...too late for Al to go to Yorkton for the big Highway 10 game where the Terriers were playing against their nemesis, the Melville Millionaires. We got the semi loaded, then got the combines in to road mode and started back to the farm.
A gorgeous day and evening, with a promise of more to come...
