Corn harvest

Life down on the farm has been slow, but very shortly things will be busy with fall harvest and wheat seeding.


This old girl is the combine that we harvest corn with.

We have started harvesting our non irrigated corn this past week. Most of the corn goes to our local "neighborhood" cattle feedlot. We sell some of our corn there directly from the field and they are very competitive on the price they pay for corn. They use corn everyday as a part of the feed ration to cattle, so they can take some corn that is too high in moisture for long term storage. When the moisture inside the kernel of corn is above 15% it will deteriorate over long storage periods and warm temperatures speed up the process.


Here is a partially harvested field of corn. We are cutting non irrigated portion of the field, foreground. The irrigated portion in the background will be harvested at a later date.

Our irrigated corn is longer maturity, planted a few days later, and had water when the planted needed it the most so it matures slower. Corn has an amazing ability to maintain grain quality and not fall down while standing in the field so it might not be harvested until November after soybean harvest and wheat seeding. Much of our irrigated corn will be stored on the farm and sold later to either the "neighborhood" feedlot, one of the feedlots within 100 miles of the farm, or an elevator that might blend higher quality with lower quality corn and will most likely sell it to a feedlot or ethanol plant. The demand for corn in my part of Kansas is higher than the supply which allows us to take advantage of good prices.

What's happening down on the farm.

I would like to wish everyone a belated merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year. Grain Sorghum harvest is finished. The snow was on the ground, but we able to keep the combines rolling after a few days let the snow work out the grain heads.


Snow between the rows of sorghum. I found it funny to harvest a tropical plant with snow on the ground.

A picture of my dad harvesting in the snow. We had to leave some on the edge where the snow drifted. Snow will plug up the inside of the combine that seperates the grain from the rest of the plant.

We started on the double crop sunflowers. Seed has shattered out of the heads, the last 2 fields that were planted had shattered bad and won't be harvested. The sunflowers that are still in the field seem to be holding their seeds good.

At the moment our attention has shifted to delivering corn that is stored on the farm. We are taking it to a local cattle feedlot where it will be combined with hay, wet distillers grain with solubles, and supplement to be fed to the cattle. The corn provides the energy and some of the protein in the diet. Hay helps ruminants, animals with four compartment stomachs, digest feed and provides some nutrients. The wet distillers grain with solubles is the grain that is left over from making ethanol, it is high in protein and minerals. Supplements are additional minerals that the feed is lacking. This makes for a very efficient method of raising tender and juicy beef. I weigh in and out on their scales next to the where they move cattle to the vet shed for vaccinations and I see the cattle handled quietly and calmly with a low amount of stress.


Unloading corn at the feedlot. The machine on the left grinds the corn, making it more palatable and the nutrients more available.