Harvest Season

2011 Harvest Season Recap

The hard, red wheat area of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kasnas has been in a drought since last summer. In early April, it looked as if most of the wheat would not even be good enough to harvest until a few areas began getting some rain. We were fortunate that the Burkburnett area of Texas got some of those rains, and we had about half of our acres to harvest. They produced about a half of a crop. Better than nothing to harvest. We now have part of our crew and are only taking two machines to Texas.

Because of the dry weather, the crop ripened early, and we were harvesting wheat by May 13th. The next five days were good harvesting weather, and we finished our shortened stop on the Red River between Texas and Oklahoma. Yields were from 9-22 bushels/acre.

Moving back to Alva, OK where the rest of the crew and the other combines join us.

On May 31st, we start harvesting in the Alva area. The wheat is better with yields from 20-50 bu/ac with about a 35 bu average for the area. The crew is starting to get to know each other and understand how we like to have things dones. Harvest lasted about a week, and we are now ready to split the machines and take two to Guymon, OK and do the irrigated wheat. The other two will go home to Ellis to get ready for our own harvest.

It has been very dry in the Guymon area and most of the dry land wheat isn't even good enough to harvest. By the 15th of May, we were harvesting there with poor yields for irrigated wheat with an average around 40 bu/ac. The combines are running well, and the four young men that ran the crew there did a real good job.

Harvest at Ellis started on June 21st, and we finished harvest there by the 30th of June. We had better yields from 20-60 with about a 45 bu/average.

We move two combines to Colby, KS for a small job and the others to Big Springs, NE. The combines at Colby got caught in rainy weather. We get some rain at Big Springs to start with but then harvest moves along quite well. Our yields were pretty good with an average around 37 bu/ac. The rain and wet weather has delayed us enough that we are now being hurried to get to our new harvest stop at Hayes, South Dakota.

By the 21st of July, we have all the combines harvesting in South Dakota. We had big fields with great yields and lots of bushels per day being harvested. We were running six combines ourselves, and the farmer had two of his own. We actually had brought in some additional trucks to help keep up with the extra hauling (busheles and miles to haul). This was the first time to help this farmer, but what a great job to be on. We have great harvest weather and by the 31st of July, we have finished this stop. The crew grew up fast with lots of long hours and hard work. Thanks!

This was a unique harvest season because the weather was too dry in the South and too wet in the North wheat belt. For this reason, we are only taking two combines to Montana, and will then move two to a new job at Reeder, North Dakota. We have been going to Loma, Montana for over 35 years to harvest for the same family. This is about a 700 mile move, so it is a real commitment. By the 3rd of August, we are harvesting wheat on Loma hill. The first part of the Montana harvest went fast. After the last part of the wheat matured, we finished the job.

Some of us then go back to South Dakota and move equipment to Reeder, ND to start our new job. By the 15th of August, we are harvesting wheat on the South-North Dakota border. This ends up being a very good job working for some really good farmers that were fun to work with. The crop growing season started out wet but soon dried off too. The dry weather almost cost the farmer the crop. The later crop is much better than the early crop because of the moisture.

Meanwhile the combines finish in Montana, and we had to hurry to get them back to our big job north of Minot, ND. The planting and growing season had been so wet there that most of the land was preventive planted, so we had very little to do. Normally it takes all the equipment we have, but we only used two combines to harvest what they did get planted.

The combines at Reeder finish first, and we haul them back to Kasnas for fall harvest by the 7th of September. The combines at Bottineau finish harvest on the 10th of September, and we get the equipment moved home the next few days.

What an interesting summer wheat harvest season for all of us with different stops, different farmers, and a lot of shuffling of our young men and equipment. I am ready for fall harvest.

Fall Harvest

Our fall harvest was shortened because of the very dry weather we had during the growing season where we harvest. First of all, it forgot to rain in the Guymon, OK area and even the irrigated corn with small water wells couldn't produce a crop. Yields were off on even the circles with good water. We took one combine and a kart there and did the job. It took longer to harvest because the corn wouldn't dry down. All in all it was okay.

The dry land corn of our own in the Ellis area was chopped for silage. What we did harvest made between 11-40 bu/acre. We lost lots of acres that we would normally harvest due to the drought.

The best crop that we did was soybeans (irrigated). We had yields in the high 70's. We worked both in Scott City and Macksville.

Our dry land corn job at Gove, KS was really good with them getting some timely rains. We had yields in the low 100's. Gove is always one of our most fun places to work in the fall. They run one combine and one kart like ours, so we get a lot done in a day. We get to do a lot of ag-bagging which is fun for the kart operators.

2011 was a very successful harvest season as our 8120's performed with few stops. Secondly, the best part again was the good young men that we had to help us with all of our harvesting. The guys measured up by running some of the jobs by themselves and performing to our high standards. It was fun again to see them develop as young men as the season progressed. Again, thank you to all who helped.

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