Rained Out

We got rained out planting last night on the Highland and Clinton County line. A rain came out of the southeast and swirled counter clockwise and got it too wet to plant.

This is killed fescue on one farm and killed cereal rye on the new farm. I have never seen any grass smoked so fast as these fields died. I used Gramoxone on the new farm and added some Round Up or gly as we call it now, short for glyphosate on the new 4 acre fescue patch I am adding this year. There is so much generic glyphosate on the market we just call it gly.

I met a scientist who was looking for birds and wildlife and he complimented me on the conservation work. He found more meadowlarks and bobwhite quail on our farms than anywhere else. We have a lot of red and blue birds in that area, too. I explained to him we believe in keeping the ground covered though it is hard to do.

The soil is working better the farther we go on planting and just about perfect now. With our notill setup we can plant successfully where you would have to work up ground instead and that is just a waste of time and money and soil to me.

About the time we finish planting, all the corn needs side dressed and then wheat and barley harvest is going to come early again this year and probably ready before we get done side dressing. Too much water and now too much heat is going to really speed up maturity on the cereal grains. The rye we killed was in flower and it is usually a later pollinating crop.

Two weeks ago we had 2-4 inches and last week we ranged from zero to .39 inches in our 30 mile radius. I think the big high ridge that has set up out west may keep us from getting the rain we will need this summer. It is supposed to get to 90 degrees again today.

We went from a record wet spring right into a hot dry summer 3 weeks before the summer solstice. Some climatologists say to expect this for the next 30 years.

That makes it really challenging to farm.

There is no corn this year as tall as the picture from a year ago today.

Ed