September 4, 2017

View of the day-More of the same...up and back in the canola.

Yesterday we got an early start, but it didn't last long as Al picked up some barbed wire in one of the swaths. The wire got wrapped around the front of the rotor, so we had to spend an hour or so getting in through a four inch slot under the feederhouse. Not an easy task, but we eventually got it out.

Marilyn took over combining in the afternoon to give Al some time off. He went back to the camper to watch the Saskatchewan Roughriders win their annual grudge football game with the Winnipeg Bombers.

Today we had an early start again...once all the filters got blown out, that is. Even with all the wind blowing, they get pretty dirty. Once clean, Al was back at it.

Marilyn brought lunch out, then went back to the camper to make the coffee Al ordered with lunch...but she forgot to take. She went back to the camper and Al continued picking up canola.

He continued until just after 10pm when they had filled the trucks and quit for the night. More of the same tomorrow...

September 2, 2017

View of the day-The buggy man is challenged even more with getting around the swaths, as we are in canola.

The combines got rolling around 9am and put in 12 good hours of picking up canola swaths. Even with the moves between fields, each combine got over 140 acres covered today...talk about productivity!!

We had a strong wind for most of the day, but at sunset, it completely disappeared. This made it hard to find the swaths in the haze, so we hope there weren't any strays left out there.

More harvest weather predicted, so tomorrow will be another busy day...

September 1, 2017

View of the day-A brisk wind blows as the machines were serviced for action today.

We had a few random sprinkles during the night, but not enough to delay the 10am starting time this morning. Marilyn shuttled drivers to trucks in various parts of the field to help ease the racing around that the poor cart driver was subject to. He has a job like herding cats, to try to keep all the machines in the same general area of the field. With only cell phone communication, the instructions tend to get delayed just long enough to make them useless when one of the "cats" veers off.

With all five machines running it didn't take long to cut 350 acres. As a matter of fact, the combines were getting cleaned off before 5pm. The spring wheat was finished.

Al brought the combine back to the yard to blow out the rads, filters and change headers. Since we were done with the straight cutting, we needed to get set up to start in on the canola swaths tomorrow.

Perfect weather for the Labor Day weekend...and more importantly, harvest...

August 31, 2017

View of the day-All five machines moving to the last spring wheat fields.

Marilyn was missing in action for the last couple of days, so no pictures or blog. She was helping to move her mom and dad over to a new apartment. Her dad just celebrated his 91st birthday and he mom's 87th is coming up at the end of September, so you can just imaging the amount of stuff that had been packed into their two bedroom suite. And it had to be downsized to a one bedroom...we had our work cut out for us.

Al, on the other hand, was making dust from early morning to late at night. The weather has been perfect and the crop, close enough to dry to be taken off. Three other combines from another custom crew showed up, so we have a full crew with a couple of extra trucks. No rest for the poor buggy driver...but he doesn't miss a beat.

We were in a storm watch for most of the day, but so far it has moved to the north. Where it can stay, thank you very much...

August 28, 2017

View of the day-One of three pull-type combines working across the road from us today.

Al was out early to start combining in the oats. If today went without incident, it would be the last of the oats. Marilyn didn't need to go out until lunch time, so she worked on getting some water issues looked after at the camper.

Marilyn had gone back to Yorkton on Friday to be ready to hit the floor at Staples first thing Saturday morning. It was her weekend to work, so she got to see what the latest happenings were in the bright lights. Not much new that she could see.

On the way back Sunday after she finished work, she was surprised to not see a lot of combines in the field. Wait. There were combines in the fields, they just weren't making any dust. In the 100 miles back to the field, she saw two...which was't much considering how perfect the weather has been.

Today was a different story. There was dust flying everywhere and there was very little wind, which made it just hang. And it was HOT...even by southern standards...it was over 92ºF. But it was a dry heat...only 17% humidity.

We did get the oats done, then got moved a couple miles over to the first of the spring wheat. After cutting a semi load for a test "sample". We called it a day.

We'll see what the sample tells us tomorrow...

August 24, 2017

View of the day-Got started in the oats.

Got the combine moved out to the field this morning, ready to start cutting oats once we got the go-ahead. There was a heavy dew on everything this morning, so the start time had changed, although there was a strong east wind that helped to speed the drying.

We were down to two combines, but it was just as well, since the oats was running in the high bushels, and the haul to the bins was a 20 mile round trip.

Marilyn had a visit from one of her theatre friends, who was passing by on her way back from Carlyle to Yorkton. This year she didn't get a ride in the combine, since Al was doing the driving.

We quit just after we lost the sun behind a cloud bank...the straw was getting really tough and we didn't want to plug anything up.

We learned our lesson on that, the hard way...

August 23, 2017

View of the day-Our puzzler for the day. How to fit the header on the new high speed trailer, without hitting the tires together.

It was parts run day. We drove over to Windthorst to get a few parts for the header and to return the chopper belt that we didn't need. Marilyn talked to the service manager about the autosteer, but since the tech was on holidays this week, he had no solution. The product specialist for the area was supposed to give her a call back, but that never happened either.

On the way home, we swung by to check out the RV facilities at the next farmers job that we have. It is between Kipling and Windthorst, so the drive will be too long from where we are parked now. After a chat with the farmer we headed back to the camper after lunch in Kipling.

Al blew out the rads...a job Marilyn thought he had accomplished yesterday. Then we set in to see if we could get the brackets on the new header trailer set in the right spots for transport. This was not going to be an easy job. The trailer is capable of hauling a 40ft header and ours is only 35ft. You think that would make it easier to set down just about anywhere on the trailer...except for two things...the wheels on the axles.

We moved the brackets back and forth to try and tweak them, but every time those axle wheels were either in the way of the header transport or else the feeder house.

We took a break to go on the internet to see if there were any pictures of a MacDon header on one of these ArcFab trailers. There were some pictures...either the wrong angle or such poor resolution that we couldn't tell what was going on. It looks like the only thing to do is move one of the axles back a ways so the tires on the header fit between the axles. We don't need the trailer for a while, so that will be a rainy day project.

While cleaning up a memory card from one of the cameras, Marilyn found a shot of our Parking Lot Farm Toy sale from the July long weekend. We set up at H&R Block where we work in the off season...Al full time and Marilyn part time around her Staples hours. We even had the Mini88, our 1/4 scale combine. It really had the people pulling in off the street to check it out and have their pictures taken on it.

And there were actually harvesting pictures on it as well...and current ones, to boot.

A couple more barley cutting shots to close out the day.

Tomorrow is oats day...