StillwatersIowa

Have you been helped out lately? Have you helped someone? Sometimes it's assisting with a project. Other times it's just a smile, greeting, or conversation that helps folks. I had welded some manure pipe couplers together incorrectly and needed to try again. So I went to Alan at Rural Water's shop and he helped out. He and Barb's son Brett manages a local truck repair shop and is also helpful with some of our semi repairs.  It's always helpful when a hot meal comes to the field, especially at night. Cassia and the kids came out the last night of soybean combining. Emily and Jackson also helped out. Kristin had made supper the previous night however I was combining corn at a different location. Jan made breakfast sandwiches one evening that we ate while transitioning from one farm to another. A huge thank you to the gals. One day when we were combining at Ed and Mary's place, John, a neighbor came out to watch. I was thankful Karl took the time to have a...

I spent a fair amount of time delivering crop this past week for ourselves and others. As you watch the crop come out do you ever wonder where it all goes? We are blessed here in Iowa to have the ability to raise, harvest, and deliver a lot of corn and soybeans. If Iowa were it's own country we would be the 4th largest crop grower in the world.  As we were reminded yesterday listening to the football game our country needs farmers. Just a little over one percent of our population raises food to feed the world.   In our country we spend less than 10% of our income on food. And the quantity and quality in our stores are the best in the world. Yet how many folks even know where it comes from and how it gets on the shelves and in the freezers. We worked for a fellow up north this week that chose to store his soybeans at the local elevator in town. This was my first time delivering to Guernsey. Remember when you are on Hwy 21 heading for I80 and you look to th...

I learned a new word and it's meaning this past week. Vertigo is a term used when a couple of small rocks come loose between a persons ears and everything turns upside down causing one to have no balance, become dizzy, and get really sick. We were combining and I started  having trouble focusing and couldn't keep the corn head snouts in between the 12 corn rows. Kurt and Brad helped me in a pickup and Kurt and Jan took me to the ER where after some IVs and rest the little rocks settled down. We've had a topsy-turvy week trying to harvest soybeans only to go back to combining corn every time the weather doesn't cooperate.  When the soybeans get to 14% moisture we would start harvesting and not stop until the grain sample went above 14% again.   We have also been chiseling getting ready for next years corn on corn acres.  Mike had a good week building terraces.   Karl has been hauling hog manure. Karl and Kristin also got in 5600 weane...

The word, gathering, tends to feel like a "this time of year" word. Harvest time is gathering in the crop. We also associate "gathering" with the Thanksgiving season. At our house we spend September and the first week of October delivering forward sold corn contracts to Eddyville. Then, with Linda's help, we gather the checks received for those contracts and pay our obligations for the year. Now since there is more crop than expected, and prices at harvest time are often low, we are storing the remaining crop on the farm in bins.  Storing crops in town at grain elevators is an option if storage space is available however it's expensive because elevators use a shrink deduction (meaning you get credit for less bushels than you delivered), they have a drying charge if your crop moisture is higher than 14%, and they charge an up front storage fee. With current crop prices already below the cost to produce it, extra expense at the elevator compli...