View From the Cab

Work Doesn't End Even After Harvest is Complete

Once considered seasonal work, row crop farming today has become a continuous year-round job of tending crops, maintenance, product delivery, tillage, fertilization, and management.

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This year's DTN View From the Cab farmers are Jamie Harris of Madison, Fla., and Karen Johnson of Avoca, Iowa. (Jamie Harris photo by Elaine Shein; Karen Johnson photo by Nick Scalise)

By Richard Oswald

DTN Special Correspondent

LANGDON, Mo. (DTN) -- Once considered seasonal work, row crop farming today has become a continuous year-round job of tending crops, maintenance, product delivery, tillage, fertilization, and management. And for those work-brittle farmers who feel there's always time left at the end of the day, livestock. That's the way it is for View from the Cab farmers Karen and Bill Johnson of Avoca, Iowa, and Jamie Harris at Jimmy Harris and Sons family farm of Madison, Fla., where the work never ends.

It's been a couple of weeks since iron clay pea harvest began. Two custom harvesters along with the Harris' combine should have made short work of it. "We're still trying to finish up peas" Jamie told DTN late Tuesday, "but we've been having every trouble under the sun."

To start with, it rained 7 inches from Saturday through Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Iron clay pea vines became so tough that combine speeds dropped from 4 mph to chugging along at 1.9 mph. That hard running took its toll on equipment when a rotor cage and grate on one of the custom harvesters combines cracked into pieces. Vines also wrapped around the feeder house drum on Jamie's combine, creating friction -- and a fire. "My brother and I had a hose in the back of the pickup we use to get water from irrigation pumps. If it wasn't for that, the combine would probably have burned." he said.

A neighbor who does custom cutting has joined the fray with his combine. But late last night, there was another breakdown when something in the Harris combine transmission locked up. "We can shift the transmission. The hydrostat works. You can feel the combine start to move. Then it just stops." Jamie said.

Weather has improved. Lows in the 50s and highs in the 70s are a far cry from the freezing temperatures a couple of weeks ago. "We had two nights below 25. One night it got to 24. The other was 21. It really hurt the broccoli pretty bad," Jamie explained. Fortunately broccoli heads weren't developed yet, and plants weren't killed. "It bounced back better than anyone thought it would. We're hoping to start harvest this Friday or Monday," he added. Heavy rain into last week meant that still-developing broccoli needed yet another application of nitrogen through the irrigation system.

Soil samples have been taken. Results have begun coming in. Lime application on parts of the farm should begin next week. But Jamie's not always all work and no play. Friends convinced him to try duck hunting for the first time last week. Ring-necked and wood ducks were the predominant species. He liked it. And Thanksgiving was spent with his girlfriend's family, where close to 40 people enjoyed turkey, dressing, ham, creamed corn, green beans, etc. ... and "all the desserts."

What does the future hold for Jimmy Harris and Sons? They already use a drone to observe crop conditions. Jamie hopes that right isn't taken away.

Applying fertilizer in bands, post plant, could reduce applications by more than 30%. "If you can cut fertilizer by a third, that's a pretty big deal," he said.

Soybean rows will be widened from 15 inches to 36-inch twin rows. That's because narrow row canopies don't allow enough light in. Yields are better when plants can stretch out.

More specialty crops will be added; bell pepper, cucumbers, squash, and maybe some eggplant. "You need to diversify, but you can spread yourself too thin," Jamie told DTN.

Diversification includes the Midwestern staple, corn. Corn Belt farmers take note; with a crop maturing in the heat of July markets, Jamie can sell July 2015 cash corn for $4.90 per bushel.

What was the best and worst of 2014 for Jamie? Peanuts. Yields and quality were great on all but one field. 4000-plus pound-per-acre yields earned top price at $475 per ton. But the worst, one with severe insect pressure yielded half that while quality problems reduced values even further to $200 per ton. "Except for that field, it was the best yield we've ever had," Jamie said.

But with some crops still in the field and fewer than 30 days left in 2014, Jamie is reserving judgment.

"Every year is something different...It's either going to be a year to remember, or one to forget," he said.

Meanwhile outside of Avoca, Iowa, where Karen and her husband Bill are glad harvest is over, cattle chores, field work, and grain deliveries continue -- along with something else.

"Here it is Nov. 30, 2014, the 46th anniversary of when Bill and I got married on a cold day in November in 1968. We got married in the afternoon and then had a wedding dance at the Avoca Ballroom in Avoca, Iowa, where I had met Bill at a dance three years prior," Karen told DTN via email.

Intact relationships spanning close to fifty years are rare in parts of America today, but not at the Johnson house where hardship has been no stranger, either. Financial problems of the '80s and a tractor rollover that left Bill seriously injured and recuperating for months never lessened their determination to survive and thrive on the family farm.

They've succeeded yet again, in spite of a difficult 2014.

"The weather was most challenging all year. We were dealing with an unusually long cold spell in January, February, and March. We had some snow and below-freezing temperatures that made livestock chores difficult and caused trouble starting any tractors or the semi, and getting them to stay running," Karen recalled. Cattle drinking from waterers kept fresh, warm water coming in. Once feeder cattle were sold, waterers began freezing. "They stayed frozen a long time. Some cows had to be moved to a stalk field with a creek. Pipes in the ground were frozen, too," Karen explained. "Anything outside became a challenge."

But Mother Nature was just getting started. These are entries from Karen's journal; "25 degrees F. on 4/15/14 with freezes all the way to Texas. 4/19/14: Started planting corn. Slow planting progress in Midwest due to rains and storms. 5/9/2014: Planting beans. Finished on 5/10. 5/7/2014: It was 96 degrees at 4 p.m. Bad storm tonight. 5/15/2014: Cold enough outside to see my breath.

6/1/2014: replanted some patches of corn that had gotten drowned or washed out."

June came with heavy rains, hail, and tornadoes. Fields were damaged by excessive runoff with more heavy rains into September. Plant diseases were worse than normal, which meant higher operating costs due to fungicide applications. Harvest completion was delayed by three weeks until Nov. 10 because of rain and the high moisture content in the grain.

The year's high point was a February trip to Hawaii when The Johnson's left behind 13 below zero temperatures in Iowa to tour Oahu, Maui, the Big Island and Kauai. "We saw some incredibly gorgeous, awesome sights, and had great fun meeting and visiting with farmers in our group as well as people from many other states, Canada, and even the United Kingdom and Scotland, to name a few," Karen said.

A mix of crops -- corn, soybeans, and alfalfa along with pasture -- will continue to be mainstays on the farm. There are no plans for retirement. Bill hopes to consolidate calving season into early spring to even up the calf crop for more uniformity and heavier weights. "The late calves are of course smaller by sale day (they are sold in eight sorts instead of four. A larger bunch of calves will bring more money per hundredweight at the auction barn, so growing the late calves later into the selling season is not the best solution. Our calving cycles as cow/calf producers are becoming fewer and fewer as each year passes; so with the high costs involved, it takes a very sharp pencil -- or is gratification enough at this stage?" he said.

Bill told DTN that in spite of field damage from summer storms, he will stick with a favored course of action. "We've been no-till for 30 years in a flip-flop corn/bean rotation, sticking a few acres in alfalfa for a four-year stretch on one side or another, usually from the corn acres.

Although most everyone in our area has some ditches to contend with going into 2015 -- hence some amount of tillage -- we will continue to let Mother Nature address any compaction issues we might have," he said.

Yield goals? Bill feels their farm may not be the first in the area to grow 100-bushel soybeans or 300-bushel corn, but he will continue to use the best technology, farming practices, and inputs available to reach those levels. Production of specialty crops such as seed soybeans and corn for ethanol production will continue as long as they remain profitable.

Bill and Karen spent Thanksgiving hosting their family, 12 in all. One traditional mainstay of their meal is a broccoli and cheese dish made by Karen. "Although I do not like it," she said.

"Growing up, it would take a 30-pound turkey for Thanksgiving dinner, then a 10-pound turkey. Now we are up to a 20-pounder, and it looks as if we will require a 30-pounder again in a couple of years as our family changes in numbers and ages," Bill said.

Work isn't everything. Karen has other goals too. Her outlook keeps the family in farming.

"Going forward from today into 2015, I want to do some landscaping in our yard and help repair some buildings on our farmstead and get them painted. We are to get a new grandbaby in April to hold and love and enjoy. We may possibly get a new son in-law. I will strive to spend more time with my family in the New Year. I want to meet more fascinating people; travel to exciting places; have more fun; strive to stay positive and make the most of the life I have. I'm very thankful to be where I am, but I'd like to make it even better yet," she said.

This is the final installment of View From the Cab 2014. DTN would like to offer our deepest appreciation and thanks to Karen and Jamie for talking to us, week in and week out, no matter how busy or difficult the day had been.

Richard Oswald can be reached at Talk@dtn.com

Follow Richard Oswald on Twitter @RRoswald

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