October 2010

One of our tractors developed a leak in a coolant line.

To remove the line I had to take the sheet metal of the tractor.

To fix it I brazed over the area that was leaking.

The coolant line reinstalled and ready for a test drive. No leaks yet!


We are pouring a slab for our all season pig drinker.

The drinker won't freeze. This means we won't have to haul water when its -20 degrees out.

The last farmers market was the second week of October. Market starts again the first week of June.

One way to make a moldboard plow last longer is to weld old shares or moldboards to the parts that are wearing out. I patched our plow up to get it through the season, some places were starting to wear paper thin.

The end of September

Some of the winter squash harvest for this year.

Our oyster mushrooms have started fruiting.

September 20-26

Our walk in freezer is functional.

Some pork orders ready for pick up.

The field corn should be ready in a few weeks.

September 6-12th

Unloading some wheat into the dump box.

Some of the potatoes ready to dig. The rest should be ready in a couple weeks.

Tilling up one of our fields. We planted sudan grass in part of it, there was to much residue for the harrow to handle. So I had to use the moldboard plow.

Looking backward.

Sometimes you dig up rocks. This probably weighed about 70 or 80 pounds and got jammed between the plow and the opener disc.

The First Week of September

We started combining our wheat yesterday, it looks like we'll have a good harvest this year.

Once in a while I find some unusual tomatoes, this one is probably due to a double blossom on the plant.

The Last Week of August

Our Hereford hogs on pasture. They are more active in the morning and evening, during the day they just lay around.

We have automatic waterers for our pigs. Its a lot easier than hauling buckets of water.

Sorghum sudan (Sorghum bicolor) is a fast growing grass that we use as a cover crop. In some places the sudan grass is over six feet tall.

View from the tractor seat, disking in the sudan grass.

Looking backward, the disk does a nice job of knocking the grass down and chopping it up.

Ben holding some of our wine cap mushrooms which have just started fruiting.

Its not visible in this picture, but our field corn is just starting to dent (dry out).

The Second Week of August

Red and green sweet peppers.

The tomatoes have been ripening, the variety towards the front is call 'Orange Russian'.