It’s Saturday evening, June 18.  Pat and I have just returned today from Oregon, where we celebrated our son Philip’s graduation from the University of Oregon at Eugene.  He just earned his Masters Degree in Art Administration.  It was great to have our family together there with him to mark this special occasion.  We got to spend a few days in Oregon, a very beautiful place.  We even got to watch some farmers planting corn on Sauvie Island near Portland.   And looking up from those fields, we could see Mt. St. Helens or Mt. Hood in the distance.  Quite a contrast from the hills of southern Indiana.

We flew the ‘red eye’ home, and our eyes are demonstrating that today.  We are amazed at how the crops have changed in our ten days away.  The deep bluish-green corn is much taller, past knee-high, and the soybeans look like a green carpet.  The wheat is a pure yellow gold, and ready for harvest.  It has been very rainy and hot while we were in cool Oregon.  We are grateful for those conditions that make our crops grow rapidly.

The next week may be a bit overwhelming as most ‘wheat weeks’ are.  Besides cutting the wheat crop, the double-crop soybeans must be planted immediately after.  There will be some spraying to get done, and there is one field of corn that needs the nitrogen applied as a side-dress.  In addition, we must make some special preparations for the Purdue Farm Tour, which is stopping here on the morning of the 29th.  The only hitch in all this is that the Weather Channel is predicting 8 days of rain in the next 10.  We will see if that is correct, and hopefully we can get our goals accomplished in between showers.

Dennis

For the Purdue Tour, see the following website:

http://www.agecon.purdue.edu/commercialag/progevents/tour.html