The Good Country
August 14th, 2008 by Northern FarmerI can tell that the days are getting a little shorter and to tell you the truth, its all right with me. Still plenty long to get done what ever needs to get done but in a month or two it’ll be considerably shorter. Rest up these old weary bones. Took the silage chopper out today to start green chopping for daily feed and I think there’s some gear box troubles, the head doesn’t want to go into reverse. And the thing is so old that I don’t even know if John Deere carries the parts anymore. Took er for a test spin this afternoon because the hay I’ve got cut just didn’t want to dry down. Now that’s different for around these parts let me tell you! I figure tomorrow maybe bale some of that hay up. Anyway, took the chopper out to a low field of Reid’s Yellow dent and I couldn’t hardly get anything done. The head’s slip clutch was clattering and I was clutching that old JD 4320 more than ever! Luckily I had a 15/16s wrench with, (this machine was BM, before metric), and also a crescent wrench in the tractor tool box. Tightened up that slip clutch just a tad and it really worked a whole lot better! Chopped a jag for some feeding tomorrow, cut down on some hay use is the master plan and let some of them bovine critters enjoy life a tad bit more. Pastures are somewhat burned off as far as the grass supply goes so a little green chop never hurt nobody! And on this farm there is an over abundance of corn this year, all OP corn, good eating stuff.
Also the sweet corn has finally kicked in gear around here and that has become part of at least two meals a day in this household! Yesterday we went out to our early sweetcorn field across the county road to pick a bit for supper and wouldn’t you know it, coons made a hit. Now there ain’t hardly nothing that burns my hide more than that around here except for a skunk or weasel to be around our chickens. Well I had to get my butt off to church shortly for Wednesday evening service but its against the rules in my book to let them coon have even one more night in that old sweet corn patch. We got a dog, a big dog. Half German Shepard and half Golden Lab. He’s kinda dumb but has a bark that would scare anything including humans and coons so I decided to use the time tested plan and stake that big dog out at the sweet corn patch. This works pretty good, the dog don’t like it but I figure he got to earn a little of his keep around the farm too. Now he don’t ever go in the back of my pickup and he is heavy. So with the help of the family here we hoisted him up onto the truck bed for the trip across the tar road and then a quarter mile inland. After securing his chain to the truck tailgate away we went without a hitch. Pounded in a five and a half foot steel fence post along side of the sweet corn patch and chained him to it. Made sure he had plenty of food and water and commissioned him to guard duty. This morning no new coon sign in the sweet corn patch! The sixteen rows of sweetcorn we have at home have never had a coon problem. Must be because the sweet corn is planted in a field of the same day field corn, and being the field corn is open pollinated it screws up the smeller on the coons so they can’t zero in on the sweet corn so easy. The whole field smells sweet! Across the tar road in that patch the sweet corn is planted amongst the Goliath field corn and thats barely starting to tassel so the coons can zero in on the sweet aroma of the sweet corn planted out there. At least that’s my theory in this whole matter. I know I ain’t no big shot agricultural specialist but sometimes these back roads theories seem to make sense and work to!
All the other garden stuff is doing so good I can’t hardly believe it. I was getting used to disaster after disaster these last few years and when a person sees what a half way normal crop looks like it just is something else! Oh Lord am I ever thankful this year! I’ll even have a good pumpkin crop which is something I lacked for a few years. Squash is doing great, got cucumbers galore, about four time the taters in the same amount of rows as last year, Glory! Just got done picking some hot peppers for breakfast. Chop em up with a chopped up onion and fry em with some chopped up taters after I fry the local bacon, drop a couple farm fresh eggs into the pan and there I go. Presidents and kings don’t eat better than that!
This I do believe is prospering! These are major blessings and I ain’t taking them for granted either. Bringing in all that good food and it ain’t nobody’s business except our families. Can’t tax a person on it, at least not yet. Save money, allot of money and have the best food on earth! Sometimes I have to remind myself of the day to day blessings God pours out on us here. No we don’t have the latest toys and gadgets, nope, we got something a whole lot better, true prosperity! Don’t sit around and watch the TV. When the work is done and its getting dark out a person can put their nose in a good book, such as the Bible and get real wisdom, not desensitized to this culture that wants only one thing, destruction of everything good! And living like this has shown me that the Bible makes allot more sense than if a person was following society in lockstep, always trying to keep up the pace with everything new that they want us to believe that we can’t live without. Nope, let me spend the day in a corn patch, or chaining up a dog to protect a sweet corn patch from the coons in the area, or let me go out and chop weeds along the pasture fences to keep them clear. Let me be husking some corn in the back yard as I watch the chickens in the far back yard and the cattle in the three pastures that I can see from here. Let me laugh at the ducks in the back yard having the time of their lives.
You know, when a person really thinks about it the life we have is just a blessed life. Oh we have our fair share of problems but when a person looks to Jesus and not at the overwhelming problems things have a way of working out, all the time! And I pray I never forget that!
August 14th, 2008 at 10:33 pm
Hey Tom,
Glad to hear you’ve had such a good season this year. I planted my garden with a bunch of field corn for corn bread. I didn’t have room to plant the MN13 or Wapsie Valley but I still have the seed and if I can get my own piece of land next year it will be planted, all of it. Or I may plant it at a family members place.
I did plant two types of corn though. I planted some Reids yellow dent from seed I grew last year and some Leaming corn. The Leaming was not available anywhere except from the seed banks at some of the Universities. The first two samples I recieved were not viable just as they expected. Then I recieved a third sample and it was good. They only supplied it to me because there was no place else to get it.
At one time Leaming was the most common yellow field corn grown in America and it was the first improved variety. That was before Reids Yellow dent came along. After that it was still very popular especially in this region.
Since it was not available they gave me some seed asking me to return a sample to them and hoping that I might keep the variety going. It’s an amazing corn and in this area it outdoes the Reids by a long shot. Someone at the University told me that it has always had the reputation for the highest yeilds for open pollenated corn in Ohio.
This Leaming corn has been through a lot. First it was planted in a thick thistle patch. Thats the plot that was asigned to me by the land owner. I was forever pulling and digging thistles. Then the deer started eating it. So I sprayed it heavily with a deer repelant when it was a foot tall, bushy and growing like weeds. That almost killed it. The repelant ran down into the growing point and started to burn up the plants. Man did I feel stupid. I was supposed to spray a mist of repelant on the corn not give it a bath in it. I dream of being a farmer and I go out kill my corn like some sort of idiot. So I had to break off all the plants down below the damage about 3-4 inches tall. It looked like someone had run over it with a lawn mower. I felt like crying. One day it was bushy and growing like weeds and the next it was a patch of stubble.
Well you wouldn’t believe how that corn bounced back. I couldn’t believe it when the ears started growing and growing fat. They are big, fat, beautiful ears of corn and make the Reids yellow dent, “supposedly the best OP field corn ever”, look pitiful.
Then the raccoons ate some of it. Then the deer bit off some of the ear tips so I sprayed the repelant on it again, this time lightly. Now the birds are trying to eat it. They shred the husks and eat the kernals.
The Reids is doing well but the Leaming is doing great in spite of me and all the critters! I think I’m the only person in the world growing Leaming corn now. It was originaly developed in this area. It’s a great OP corn for this region of the corn belt. I’m going to keep the variety going just as the University hoped.
My pumpkins never came up. I think I planted them to deep. Then this clay soil got baked hard by the sun and those that germinated couldn’t get through the hard clay. Then I pulled up the one pumpkin with some weeds by accident. It all got replanted in beans.
I planted peanuts. I didn’t kill them like the corn. I did plant them to deep at first and again the hard clay made it difficult for them to come up. I replanted them and they are doing well now.
Anyway I’m learning and someday I will have that farm. Oh I imagine it will have to be small but to me it will be like Heaven. I’ve never had a place of my own.
I love to watch corn grow. It’s exciting!…. I must be nuts,…. or maybe just a farmer at heart.
The glory of God is all around us in his creation. He is awsome and really, really BIG!!!!
August 15th, 2008 at 9:20 am
Congrats Don, on your corn work! Don’t feel bad about mistakes, it’s the only way to learn. This year I got in a rush and planted 10 acres of Krug 90 day OP corn two weeks early (up here we shouldn’t plant OP or organic corn prior to June 1), the corn popped up nice and then we got hit with 2 weeks of cool and wet weather. The weeds took control and my corn field never recovered. Be lucky to make 20 bu an acre. Next year I’ll follow the rule!
August 15th, 2008 at 11:09 am
Don,
Life on the farm is just one big mistake after another, just hope that a person doesn’t do the same mistake to many times in a row! Interesting when you write about your experience with corn! A feller learns allot reading other folks experiences! All I know is I ain’t planting Goliath again. To durn big! The Reids is doing good, the MN 13 very good! At a glance the Mn 13 looks allot like hybrid corn because its so consistent. Nice even crop and allot of corn in it!
Brent,
Your neck of the woods is a bit wetter than our area here where the north woods meet the plains. The only thing that really kicked our corn in gear were a couple July rains and I’m thankful for that. Just came in from morning chores, supposed to take till about eight thirty and now its after 11. Had a cow out on the far pasture and took me a while to get that thing in! Now its go fix fence for a couple hours out in the brush. Just told my two daughters the good news, they get to help dad out in the brush! Luckily when I was out there I didn’t run across any mosquitoes so it shouldn’t be all that bad!
August 15th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Tom,
If that gear box ever goes out on you I know a machinist here in Cincinnati who specializes in making gears and rebuilding gear boxes. He’s the best. He rebuilt and improved some gear boxes for coal mining machinery and the original manufacturer sent a team of engineers to visit him and find out how he did it. I’m not sure if he told them anything though.
Why is the Goliath corn to big? If you are growing it for silage wouldn’t that be good as you would get more silage from it? Or is it to big for the silage cutter to easily chop it up?
Brent and Tom,
If you guys want to experiment with this Leaming corn we can trade seed after it’s dried. Just let me know if you are interested. I’ve kept it separated from the other corn by planting it at the oposite end of the property 200+ yards away. Corn pollen is heavy and drops to the ground fairly quick. I read that on average it drifts 1 foot for every foot of drop. Windy days can carry it further but at 200+ yards the risk of cross pollination is nearly non existant especially on a small garden plot like mine and their research was on large fields. The people at the University said it would be okay if it was 100 yards away and 200 would be better. I don’t know how it would do in your area but it doesn’t hurt to try.
I’m also growing some Golden Glow corn at work and Lancaster Sure Crop corn at my moms house but I won’t have enough seed to trade until the end of next season. The Golden Glow might be good in your area.
Brent,
Are you in Wisconsin? Golden Glow was very popular in Wisconsin and Michigan.
August 15th, 2008 at 8:29 pm
Don,
I have time to mull it over and one way or another it’ll get done!! Wished I could have had this problem last year 
Last year the problem was even finding the short burned down corn. At least when this is all said and done I can go through winter with feed enough to make them cows fat! About time!
I’ll figure out what to do with the gear box problem. Forward and neutral work perfect, just reverse doesn’t want to engage. Funny, never had a problem with it and was just going to run the gathering chains in reverse so I could oil em up with some used oil and nothing!
The Goliath is getting me a little concerned, its so huge! Our 120 horse tractor might not have enough snort to get through it. I have a couple options if it can’t. One is to chop one row, just take some getting used to. Second, hire a big outfit. One of them quarter million dollar choppers that can chop an oak tree
Come winter time we can see what we all got for seed and maybe try out the different varieties!
August 15th, 2008 at 10:33 pm
May I never forget!
Blessings,
Lori
August 16th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Don, I’m in NE Wisconsin, close to Michigan UP. How many day is that Leaming corn? We tend to plant in the 80-85 day range with our corn. I don’t know if you guys heard the news, but Monsanto is raising the price of Roundup and the price of RR corn is going to $300 per bag! I had to laugh when I heard that, ol’ Monsanto hooked all those folks on Roundup ready this and that and then reeled them in!
August 16th, 2008 at 7:41 pm
Amen Lori!
Brent,
I’m doing some backwoods figuring here. Now the seed I plant is cheap in comparison, (by a long shot). And the yields I get beat RR corn. Now the silage corn that I have so little put into and it grew so huge and the yield will be out of this world the cost difference should pay for a huge custom chopper to chop er up! And that’s not counting having double or triple the yield! Now I’d just love for some big shot agronomist to try and tell me about the advantages of farming with RR corn! Oh, and not to mention the stuff we plant is edible, not so with RR corn. And our stuff averages between 10 and 20 percent more protein. I just love it when I hear about what Monsanto is doing and they ain’t getting nothing from this back woods hick that can out produce any of the serfs!
August 16th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
For dinner tonight we had home raised roasted stuffed turkey,sweet corn and tomatoes from the garden. So blessed and SO thankful!!!!
August 16th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
Brent,
I’m not sure how many days till maturity the Golden Glow corn is supposed be. It was developed by what was known way back as the Wisconsin Station and was a cross of a Wisconsin strain of MN13 and a later, larger eared Wisconsin variety called North Star. It was grown in central and southern Wisconsin and Michigan. That is what I have read on the internet. I bought it from Sand Hill Preservation and am working on building up a supply of seed. However I don’t own any land and so it is going to be one more season before I have a good amount of seed. I may have a small amount to trade though this year but it would be only a small amount.
I do have a good amount of seed of an early, about 90-95 day, yellow dent corn called Nothstine from east of the Traverse City area of Michigan. It is the sweetest smelling feild corn I have ever encountered but it is not very high yeilding. It makes excellent corn bread though because of its sweetness. It is sold on the internet. I bought some last year and grew it and still have a good amount of seed. I highly recommend it for bread but not for feeding animals on account of its low yeild. However the old farmers did grow it for animal feed. Sometimes I mix it 50/50 with Hickory King to be ground for bread.
I have also bought some Northwestern dent corn that was developed I think in one of the Dakotas as a very early variety. It is a red/brown corn with a cream colored cap. I read that it was developed out of one of the Bloody Butcher strains of which there are many. I have only a very small amount and will be working to increase it.
You are welcome to try anything I have as long as I have enough to trade. Our season hear in southern Ohio is longer than yours but I still look for early varieties out of curiosity.
I have read that the Leaming also had early strains. I would think that an early strain could be selected over time by anyone interested in it. It is a great corn for this area and was spread all over the central corn belt. It was supposeldy the first improved variety in America and before Reids yellow dent was the most popular yellow field corn grown and continued to be popular, especially in Ohio up until hybrids replaced everything. It seems to be doing better than anything I have tried up to now. Mine has big, fat, tapered ears already which are finished pollinating and now filling out. Some of the husks are begining to turn brown already. It was not planted until Memorial day.
August 17th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Brent,
Sand Hill says the Golden Glow corn is a 100 day corn. I’m not sure what the Leaming is.
August 17th, 2008 at 8:14 pm
Patti,
If we didn’t have the same quality right now I’d take the drive down your way right quick to have a meal like that!! Enjoy!