23 Jul Megan: Chadron, Neb – Part II

Dad helped Brandon, James, and I get started in Chadron and then he went back home to begin cutting our own wheat with our old TR98 combine. Along with the help of my uncle and aunt, my dad and mom having been whittling away on our family’s wheat near Hemingford for the past few days.  Brandon, James and I have remained very busy in the Chadron area and hope to finish up here today or tomorrow so we can get moved back home.

Between our own wheat and our customers in Chadron and Hemingford, we have many acres of ripe wheat that need to be harvested. Now that we are near home again we have many other family members who are more than willing to help out. With so much work ahead, we are very grateful that the rest of our family can take the time to help catch us up when we really need it.

Many of the fields we are cutting near Chadron have steep terraces.

Another view of the terraces. They keep the combine operators busy since they have to cut out the terraces first then go back and pick up the strips of wheat in between them.

I cannot believe how tall some of the wheat is around Chadron. The wheat in this picture came up to my waist and I have very long legs!

Notice the unusually dark dusk coming from the combine. This is due to a large amount of moisture many of the field received this year and from rust settling in the wheat.

Dad shows James how to adjust the combine so it can windrow the straw.

Our combines are capable of producing straw windrows so that they can then be bailed. Due to the drought in southern states and the flooding in the Dakotas and eastern Nebraska, there has been a high demand for straw bales. Much of western Nebraska has been contacted to bale their wheat straw so it can be shipped out to areas in need of it.

Yesterday we cut a field literately at the Chadron Municipal Airport. It’s not very often that you see a combine and plane parked this close to one another.

The combines taxi down the runway. They couldn’t quite get up to speed to take off so we settled for cutting the wheat field at the end of the runway!

We harvested the wheat field right next to the runway. It was pretty neat watching the little “puddle jumper” planes take off and land all afternoon.

Megan can be reached at megan@allaboardharvest.com. All Aboard 2011 is sponsored by High Plains Journal and DuPont Crop Protection.