Wet Spell

It looks like my trips to the fields are over for this year.  The weatherman is calling for a wet spell that has officially set in this morning.

I was able to get another big truckload of wood out of my log pile though and only have a truck or two left in that pile.  It felt good to get another load out in this unseasonably dry fall.  With the half inch or so of rain we have had, I was able to get in and out without cutting much of a track.

Few people prefer wet weather to dry but I imagine most farmers welcome this expected rain to recharge our soils.  I had posted a link of how dry it is in the plains and how many farmers wonder if their wheat will make it.

I did notice all of my rye was coming up on that farm so we have had enough moisture to get everything out of the ground this fall.  Every acre was planted back to something and it is all up.  That's a pretty good feeling too.

While I was doing that, Steve and his crew got all of the cement pads poured under the house.  In a week or so, they will be able to level the front room floor.  Maybe we can start tackling the remodeling job of our master bedroom bathroom after that.  I still can't picture that old tub going out the window but sawed in half I guess it will.

Until we get the floor fixed, we are sticking with our Humility Tree.  That is the small Christmas tree LuAnn always decorates for our bedroom that she moved it to the living room until we see if we can get the floor repaired where our tree normally sits.  I don't know if the grand kids will know the difference as long as they get some presents!

Maybe we will stop at Grant's Farm tomorrow and see what Danny has as far as balled and burlap trees that could be planted after Christmas.  Click on the link and give him a Like for me!  I can never repay what the man did for me and the students at Clermont Northeastern.

Yesterday was the Feast of Saint Nicholas and the Advent means more to us than the tree.

If you are getting some needed moisture, enjoy the wet spell.  I will try but it's the darkest time of the year.  We do need dreary days to make a crop with the sunny days, too.

Ed

Read More

Inoculating Soybeans

A farmer asked if this would be a good year to be sure to inoculate soybeans because of the drought last summer.  Many soils were so baked out that microbial life was driven deep into the soil to find moisture and suitable temperatures.  Many Universities are even recommending farmers to inoculate their soybeans in 2013 because of the conditions in 2012.

We have talked about inoculating legumes since my first writings in this blog 4 years ago.  Whenever I see a post like this farmer made, I wonder if they understand the new inoculants?  I don't think so. 

Even though I have tried to make it clear that the "new bugs" that have been introduced to the market place are different.  In 1994, when the new USDA Strain was introduced by Dr. David Kuykendall, these new strains do not repopulate like the older "lazyier" strains before.  They need to be reintroduced each year and compete for a site to live on the nodules of legumes to do their extra work.  Their extra work brings increased plant health, nitrogen production and yield.

We still find that old mentality that once you inoculate a legume field, you are good for years and do not need to inoculate each year.  In all my tests and all my reading, I find that reintroducing these new strains each year insures I have a good chance for increased yield and Return On Investment over not inoculating every time I plant.

I picked up over 3 bushels more soybeans per acre in the few strip trials I performed.  I have to make myself do this just to get data each year because someone always asks this questions.  I have no doubt it pays since I started using that USDA Strain in 1994 and would never want to plant a soybean crop without one of the new inoculants.

The best I have found is those marketed by Advanced Biological Management in Van Wert, who feature Dr. Kuykendall's work.  The are sold as Excalibre, GraphEx in every form a farmer could need from humus to liquid sealed on the seed.  GraphEx has a very high farmer acceptance and rating has a planter box treatment.

Once again I recommend farmers to not speculate whether it works, inoculate your legumes, particularly soybeans, the number one oilseed in the world.

Ed Winkle

Read More

World Soil Day

"World Soil Day 2012 – “Securing Healthy Soils for a Food Secure World”


In 2002, the International Union of Soil Sciences (IUSS), in 2002, made a resolution proposing Dec. 5 as World Soil Day. This day is designated to celebrate the importance of soil and its vital contributions to human health and safety.

Under the framework of the Global Soil Partnership, The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations is celebrating World Soil Day 2012 in Rome on Dec. 5.

This is a well-timed opportunity for USDA-NRCS to reinforce our soil health messages, while helping to promote World Soil Day"  You might hear or see these slogans today:   You've got to watch this 5 min video on Soil! "Let's Talk About Soil"

There are more organisms in a teaspoon of soil than there are people on earth! http://ow.ly/fGewe #worldsoilday#soilhealth

No matter where your water comes from, it's been filtered by the soil!

We owe our existence to those few inches of living and life-giving top soil. Hat's off to World Soil Day!

Thank you #soilscientists for helping us better understand soil: an amazing living resource.

Take a minute on World Soil Day to learn more about soil health.

What in the world do you know about soils? Go to WorldSoilDay to learn more about soil.

Your food gets its start in the soil. Celebrate World Soil Day and the first Global Soil Week!   We celebrate soil at HyMark High Spots!   Ed Winkle

Read More

The Log Cabin

A neighbor friend took me back to look at his log cabin one time when we were scouting our fields.  We looked at some of mine and then we looked at some of his.  We ended up on the farm where his log cabin was built.  He said he told his wife one time he wanted to build a cabin there and she asked what in the world for?  He said because we can and if we don't, no one will ever get to enjoy it.  They already have a pretty neat "bunk house" so I can see why she asked.

Roger is a wealth of history around here.  He's 74 and hasn't forgot a thing about what has happened over those years and can name places and things and people like a history book.  Sometimes I just like to go talk to him.

He was renting a farm that came up for sale and I wanted to buy it.  I called him up and asked if he was going to buy it?  He hem hawed around and said, No, I am getting old and I don't think I need another farm right now.  Why don't you go ahead and buy it so I did.  He has never let me forget about it since.  I keep telling him it is still for sale.

His dad was quite famous in these parts.  I will never forget the day I opened up the department mail  back in the late 70's or early 80's and there was a check for $100 from a farmer in a neighboring school district.  He enclosed a newspaper article about my students in a local paper and wrote a note to tell me to "keep up the good work."  I didn't know the man from Adam and now I know his oldest boy.

I called him before lunch Saturday and said what in the world are you doing, Roger?  He said Oh, just a little record keeping.  I don't know how he keeps track of all his farm records but I am sure it is better than I do.  I asked if he needed a break from them and he said Sure, what do you have in mind?  I said I wanted to show LuAnn your cabin.  He said Come on over just like I told her he would, so we did.

When we got there, we discussed who would drive and finally I said why don't you drive, full knowing it would not be a short trip.  As we were driving through the creek, I said, My that is the most water I have seen around here.  He said Yeah, got some beavers down stream.  It looked clear enough to drink.

I said I wonder if this Sloan Silt Loam like the bottoms on the farm we just bought?  I knew he would say, You're the expert on that.  By that time LuAnn had clicked the Soil Web app on her cellphone and said, this land is 90% Sloan.  I said it sure isn't Hickory Silt Loam, it looks black and wet.  It sure raises a good crop in a year like this.

We got up to the 18 by 18 foot cabin where they hold the "sheepherder's ball."  He had a story about that too, a lady got invited once that knew nothing about it and she called his wife to ask what to wear.  She though maybe it was a real dressup ball.  It is a boots, hat and denim thing, you know, he said.

By that time we finally got there in low gear I think, I needed to use the facilities and assumed there was none.  Sure enough though, he had a nice outhouse in the back!  It even had toiletpaper the squirrels hadn't ruined!  There were lots of acorn pieces by the lid, though!

After we were done looking he was off the races showing us old brick houses telling us stories about them and even pulled up to a brick outhouse.  There aren't many of them around!

There are some pretty neat places around here if you ever get lost in southwest Ohio.  Just ask for Ed Winkle.  They will show you here.  Just ask Mr. Wilson, or Doug or any of our great visitors!

Ed Winkle

Read More

Wheat December 2012

The wheat crop has the poorest ratings of condition since the ratings began back in the 80's.  Many of us producers have been looking at some wheat roots. One friend in Missouri write the roots are "Very small, not as much root growth as other years. Less that half the root system as other years."

Wheat also made the news this week for gene mapping.  This news identifies nearly 96,000 chromosomes and what they are linked to, compared to 47,000 chromosomes for apples.

There is concern for the crop among growers.  In this thread, a fellow talked about planting wheat in January and it still making a crop.  I had never heard of anything like it.  Wheat is a tough crop and those 96,000 chromosomes are linked to a lot of durability over the ages!

Some of my friends have bought wheat calls thinking the market has no where to go but up.  My best guess is that a $10.40 July wheat call bought for around 30 cents today has a 70% or better chance of making money.  This is pure speculation on my part and I know enough to be dangerous.  There has been some discussion on Market Talk the past few months.

I have raised more wheat in the last nine years than I ever dreamed I would.  The total is well over 1000 acres because I planted 700 in the fall of 2009.  There is over 100 acres planted here on top of the hill this fall.  I can't say I ever made that much money with wheat but add it to the double crop soybeans or cover crops planted in July and I think it's been a good investment.

My highest gross income per acre has been corn and soybeans have not been far behind.  They both yield better for me when wheat has been in my rotation before the corn or soybeans.  When the wheat is combined and you follow that combine with a notill drill full of soybeans, the outcome has always been profitable for me.

It takes more steps to get there but it keeps something growing on that soil all year long.  I think there is more to be said for that than anyone one of us can explain or imagine.

I do have a question on my wheat right now though, my radishes are getting big and so are the winter annuals.  We have a dry, open winter.  I am not sure we will get 3 nights in the teens to kill the radishes.

Should I kill the winter annuals and the radishes soon with a spray of Harmony Extra?  The picture was taken October 12 so you can imagine how tall they are now.

Ed

Read More

Gully

By golly I found the source of my gully on our new farm.  You wouldn't think the little bit of water that seems to come across the neighbor's field under this dip in the fence could cause the deep wash a few feet beyond!

I would say we have some Highly Erodible Land there!  I am not sure how I am going to try to fix it yet so I am open to suggestions.  I really need the cooperation of the neighbor but I haven't even met the man yet.  He is elderly so maybe we will get a chance to gain control of it by ownership in the next few years.  Then again, maybe not, who knows?

I am not sure if he even no-tills.  It's in bean stubble now so it should have been seeded down to wheat or a cover crop.  The fall has been dry so there is no increased erosion this year.  Much of it happened last year when we had double normal rainfall.  But the gully looks old so it has been happening a long time.

I do have a load of bricks from under the house I can help fill the gully with.  I think I want to run a tile down through it to the creek and keep the top in sod.  It lends itself to a sod waterway very well.

Speaking of the bricks, we were talking to our neighbor Roger and he said he thought the Turner Family built our house here on Martinsville Road.  He explained that the Turner Cemetery part of the Martinsville IOOF Cemetery was made from the digging for cellars on the Turner properties.  He said the Turner's were riverboat people in the late 1700's and bought a lot of land around Martinsville and settled here.  We did not know that.  The soil from under our house is probably on that mound of dirt!

I mentioned our crumbly bricks and he said the clay they used was probably part of the problem but the major problem was they didn't fire the brick long enough to burn off the impurities.  That makes a lot of sense, too.  Some of the old houses around here are very intact and others like ours, have had to have a lot of reconstruction to still be standing.  Ours is painted white to seal out the moisture and others are the still the red clay they dug back in those days to make the bricks.

We finally got a shower this morning to settle the dust and green the wheat back up a bit.  We only had an inch or so in November so it has been a very dry fall.  Not as dry as the center of the drought map, but pretty dry for southwest Ohio.

Who knows what the New Year will bring but this drought seems to be hanging in there.  Water erosion won't be the problem out west as much as wind erosion if this pattern doesn't change.

Ed

Read More

December Auction

It's another beautiful day in southwest Ohio, especially for the first of December.  We thought we would drive down to Brown County for a chattel auction by Joel Wilson.  My former student Dave Lewis and his dad auctioneer with Joel and his mother helps with the paperwork.

Everytime I go to one of their auctions I run into my former school treasurer, Brian Switzer.  He always says the same thing.  "Ed, we need you back at CNE.  The ag program is a mess."  I left that job 10 years ago to all the young folk I trained the 30 years before that.

We soon found out the auction was a sad story.  In September, the man came in one day and told his wife he didn't feel well but they didn't think much of it.  She went shopping and came home and found him dead in the bed.  He was 53.  We don't know the day or hour but it is coming for all of us.

He had assembled a really nice 40 by 60 foot shop full of tools and collectibles.  The building had a nice loft that reminded of the one we built in the new shop we built in 83 at Blanchester Schools.

He liked old combines and had a White 8600 with a Mud Hog on it from Brookston, Indiana.  Now they are pretty much standard on any combine around here.  He also had a yellow New Holland combine with both heads, too.  I don't know what they will bring but it won't be much.  I wouldn't mind tinkering with either one but it would be more hassle than it's worth.  You really have to enjoy working on machinery to own an old machine like that, or have no other way to combine your crops.

Before the combine, we had corn pickers.  Before corn pickers, we had corn cutters that shocked the corn into bundles.  Before then, it was all hand husked like dad and grandpa did.  They became husking heroes like this youtube tells about.  I saw a few old "husking heroes" at the auction today but most of them are gone now.

LuAnn found an old maple butcher block table that was like the one she had 30 years ago.  She almost left a bid on it.  I couldn't lift one leg of that heavy table.

Read More