Ready to head home!!!

[DianaB]

For the past couple of days Glen and I have been on the road looking for a corn header for his combine. We spent the night in Topeka a couple of nights ago. We didn't leave home until 7:30 so we didn't make it too far. We got up early and headed for Nebraska. We have driven all over the eastern half of Nebraska looking only at corn headers!!!! He finally decided which one he was interested in so we headed back to that town to spend the night only to find that every room was taken by construction workers! We had to drive almost an hour before we finally came to a town big enough to even have a motel!!! It ended up being 10:30 by the time we got a room, but it was certainly worth the wait!!! We're at the Hampton Inn and it must be fairly new and is decorated very stylish!!! I was very impressed! This morning Glen got up early and drove back to the town, stopping on the way to look at another one, which he ended up buying instead of the other one, so I'm still here at the motel. It was so nice because I got to sleep in and take my time getting ready and I've got some time to be on here before he shows up to get me.

We borrowed a pickup from a friend that's nicer than anything we have as far as traveling but we've been pulling a trailer to carry the header back home and the ride has been horrible!!! I'm so sore this morning from being jerked and jolted around! We're headed back home today with our mission accomplished! I really pray that this is a good header with few problems!

[Janet]

I didn't even know you two took a road trip...how cool. I have got to say to heck with the camper and get me a laptop...lol. So glad Glenn found was he was looking for in the corn head. I love it when the combines are in the fields and the grain dryers are going. Of course I know they don't really want to use the dryers, but to me...it's the sound of fall.

Have a safe trip home.

[DianaB]

We made it home a little while ago. We went over 1,000 bumpy miles!!!! I've got some pictures that I took today that I'll try to get on tomorrow. Glen was really happy to have found just what he was looking for.

[Gina]

Diana being a city girl I don't know what a corn header is, lol but I hope you found what you were looking for. You and Glen make this trip sound so romantic lol I must say Diana you are a wonderful couple.. How many women would have driven so many miles to look for that piece of equpiment. None that I know of.. Glen is a lucky guy! <wink> tell him I told you so....

[DianaB]

The header on a combine is the part that cuts the grain. Corn takes a different head than other grains. Here's a picture of what a corn header looks like (in the first photo) When it's running the header can move up or down depending on how high the corn is on the stalk. The corn is planted in rows and each row goes in between the parts that point out when the stalk is jerked down and the ear is pushed off and into another part that feeds it on into the combine where it is shucked and taken off of the cob and separated from all of that and stored in a bin on the combine. When the combine is full then you drive it up to a truck and put the auger out and empty the grain into a truck.

In the second and third picture you can see the rows of corn before the combine picks it. The third picture shows a combine unloading into an auger wagon that's pulled by a tractor. When you have an auger wagon the combine doesn't have to stop and unload. It can keep going and the auger wagon does the unloading for it.

[DianaB]

It's really interesting to ride during corn harvest. It's my favorite of all the crops to see being harvested.

A regular combine header looks like these. The bars that you see going across in front of the combine go around like a paddle wheel on a boat. The paddles gently push the grain into the combine where little blades cut it off and it's pulled into the combine to separate the stalk from the grain. We use this header to cut wheat, soybeans and milo. I think that in these pictures that you'll see wheat and soybeans being cut. It really is interesting!

As for going with my husband, he really is a dear. He's gotten to where he really babies me and so going with him is a real treat. I do have a really special guy and we have a great marriage. We do have our moments but they never seem to last for long. Riding in the pickup wasn't much fun but being with him definitely was!!!!! I even told him the "boob" joke that Judy posted!!! He figured it out before I got to the punch line!!!!! I wish that you could come and join us for harvest for a couple of days, Gina. It's very interesting.

[Marilyn]

Are y'all having to store your own grain this year? The farmers around here couldn't send their grain to the big storage facilities, they are all still full up, so the farmers have bought these huge white insulated bags and are storing the grain in the bags in their fields. They look like hugh white catepillars scattered on the turning rows. The bags cost thousands of dollars, but it's cheaper to store this way than to pay the silos and trucking. I think the farmers are waiting for the demand to increase and the prices to go up. They not only had to pay for the bags, but the equipment to fill them and to empty them. They are reusable. Not all the farmers invested in the handling equipment. The ones who did are selling their services to the ones who did not.

I work with a farmer's wife, and she keeps us up on what is going on and explained what the big white bags were all about. The have to put electric fences around them to help keep varments away. Her husband owns combines and sells his harvesting services as well. He retired from the phone company last year and is doing the farming full time now.

[DianaB]

We have our own grain bins to store our grain in. Matter-of-fact, I have to drive right by them to get to our house! We also rent some from some retired farmers. We always store our grain because my husband tries to get the best price and it's not always the best price at harvest.

[Janet]

Diana, I love riding with the neighbors in their combines. My favorite is the corn. I've seen many deer take off running through the corn. They use to take Ricky when he was little all the time. They also bought him the nice combines (w/bean and corn head), tractors, wagons, augers the whole bit. I was fine with that, but then they gave him a bunch of corn and soybeans. Ricky would spread it all out on his bedroom floor and then pretend he was harvesting...lol. So darn cute.......until I ran the sweeper...LOLOL. I love living in the country and wish we could have been successful farmers.