Wednesday, August 20, 2014

Back at the farm today after Pat and I took a couple days to visit our sister Sheila and her husband John over in SE Indiana, near Rising Sun.  We enjoyed our brief visit with them.  Seems like our relationship gets more precious as the years go by.  Certainly more than in our teenage years!

Pat and I with Sheila and John Hobson pause in the beautiful gardens at the Creation Museum, not many miles from their home.

We also briefly visited with one of John’s friends, Sam Fox, a Rising Sun, Indiana farmer.  We discussed the progress of the 2014 crop, the prospects for fall harvest, and Sam’s experience as a school board member.  It was a pleasure to meet him and his two sons, Ryan and Adam.   Theirs is a top-notch operation!

The corn head for the 8230 combine arrived yesterday.  Like the Geringhoff (a German manufacturer) header we traded in, it has a folding mechanism to speed up the moving process.  With this feature, the corn head does not have to be removed from the combine and hauled lengthwise to the next field; it simply folds the wings over and the combine is driven down the road with the head attached.  This header is here in plenty of time for fall harvest, which is just a few weeks away.

The new CIH 4412F corn head

This new header includes these ‘feelers’ that will enable AutoGuide automatic steering.

Today brought us a very clear blue-sky morning.  No fog today like many of our August mornings so far. The blue morning skies clouded over for a drizzly afternoon.  We did not get up to the 90s temperature that was predicted, but the clouds kept the temps in the 70s.

I will attend a special informational meeting this evening at Huntingburg, Indiana.  In that meeting, representatives of the state Farm Service Agency (FSA) will explain some of the details and options available from the 2014 Farm Bill.  So far, it has been a puzzle to figure out how the law’s provisions will affect our operation.  Hopefully, I’ll gain a more thorough understanding this evening, and can begin to choose our path through this bureaucratic maze.