The End of September

We dug the rest of our potatoes today. A potato digger is an interesting machine. It digs the spuds and separates the soil.


Our potato digger is really old, it was originally set up to be pulled by a team of horses! We modified it to use on our tractor. We're missing a set of chains for the digger so it just drops the potatoes of the ground. We have some chains, but they are to big and will have to be modified to fit.

Yields were alright considering the lack of moisture this year. Contrary to popular belief potatoes did not originate in Ireland. Potatoes are native to the Andes region of South America. There is a secondary center of origin in Central America.

There's usually a few monster tomatoes in the greenhouse each year.

A little while back we purchased a grain drill (planter). Its a John Deere Van Brunt Model B Drill that was built in the 1950's or early 60's. The nice thing about John Deere equipment is that you can find parts manuals on their website.

Three of the planting boots are broken. Basically the function of the planting boot is to push the soil aside while the seed is dropped through the center of the boot. For some reason two of the boots had been welded and riveted to the support bar. With an acetylene torch I chopped off the bigger chunks of steel.

To avoid destroying the support bar I used and angle grinder to finish removing the welds. Then with a chisel the piece came off! To be continued...