Pickin' Corn
On Wednesday, October 13th, my brother, Jim, called asking if I could come to Blue Earth to help him harvest the fall corn crop. So I drove down to Blue Earth that afternoon and spent the next 6 days helping him.
We worked from 5:30 AM till 9:30 PM. I had a variety of jobs.
| Mostly I drove a tractor to chop the stalks after the corn is picked - with the objective of keeping up with the picker. Each implement (Jim's combine & my chopper) take 6 rows at a time. Then Steve Smith and one of his men, Bobby, drive the filled wagons of corn to the elevator in Blue Earth. My other tasks are |
| running to town to pick up parts when something breaks. Or I |
| drive to haul people from one field to another. Or I |
| drive the tractor & wagon following the picker in order to empty the picker tank in the middle of the field. Or I |
| pull the fuel wagon from one field to the next. Or i |
| pull a wagon of shelled corn to town to the Blue Earth elevator - since the "Swim Inn" bridge is closed (being rebuilt) we have to drive right down 7th Street - the main East - West street in Blue Earth. |
On Saturday morning, we had about 90 acres of corn left to pick and should be finished with most of it by Monday evening. Diane packs us breakfast & lunch so that we minimize our stoppage time. I am extremely tired at night because I'm not used to working this hard. But after a good 8 hour sleep, the next day seems ready to attack.
Late Monday evening, I broke the chopper and haven't heard from Jim on how difficult it was to fix.
Tractors I drove include a John Deere 4230 and 4430 to pull wagons and a model 4440 for chopping stocks. Fortunately, controls on each are very similar. So there's no learning curve.
To see a short video of the combine coming across a field, click the word LINK.
And we did finish picking late Monday evening. Afterwhich I drove home. Got home 'bout 8:30 PM. Exhausted.
Panorama of corn field.
Typical tractor & wagon used to haul 400 - 600 bushels (wagon sizes vary) of shelled corn to Blue Earth elevator.
Combine picking corn. Does about 50 acres each day.
Combine emptying onboard tank into wagon bound for the elevator. If you look close, Jim is in the combine cab.
Here's Jim in early morning blowing out all the dust that collects in the combine (last year, before the blower, the combine caught fire).
Stock chopper behind the fuel wagon.
Above is the stock chopper pulled by a John Deere model 4440.
On Saturday evening, Barry's father and his wife joined us for dinner along with Barry & Kristina's family, Jastin, & Sammi.
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