I was talking to Dale, a former farm kid.\u00a0 I was telling him how harvest was going.\u00a0 Dale tolerated me a while, and then said, \u201cYou corn and bean farmers.\u00a0 You\u2019ve got about as much to do as me mowing my lawn.\u00a0 You get your machinery out a few times a year like I get my lawn mower out.\u201d<\/p>\n
My comeback was, \u201cYeah, but the government gives us a bunch of money, so this must be important.\u201d\u00a0 To which, he said he should get a Lawn Support Payment.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t argue with that.\u00a0 It made about as much sense as some farm payments.<\/p>\n
Farm kids like Dale and me grew up on diversified farms with day-long and year-round lists of things to do.\u00a0 With cows, steers, pigs, chickens, corn, soybeans, oats, alfalfa, not to mention kids and a garden, the work literally never ended for our parents.<\/p>\n
Now animals are mostly raised in large confinement operations, and a shrinking number of us raise corn and soybeans on the surrounding land.\u00a0 I admit there are gaps on the calendar for crop farmers.\u00a0 There\u2019s time to do other things.\u00a0 Frivolous things.\u00a0 Like write a newspaper column.<\/p>\n
Springs and falls are still intensely busy.\u00a0 Yes, more than mowing your lawn.\u00a0 Every harvest, a few days stand out that become stories to share with fellow farmers.\u00a0 Those are days that don\u2019t go as planned.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a couple from Harvest 2020.<\/p>\n
I was unloading corn in the yard.\u00a0 Nephew Jay was running the combine.\u00a0 I got a text, which usually meant a wagon was full.\u00a0 This time it was a short video with the message, \u201cIs this dust or smoke?\u201d\u00a0 The video showed wispy white something coming from the side of the corn head.<\/p>\n
Oh oh.\u00a0 There\u2019s a lot of dust around a combine, but not like that.\u00a0 I jumped in the pickup and raced to the field.\u00a0 Jay was out of the combine.\u00a0 There is a panel on the side of the corn head covering the pulleys and chains that propel everything.\u00a0 Smoke was sifting out around the edges of that.<\/p>\n
That cover is held on by six bolts.\u00a0 I grabbed a wrench, got the first one off, and pulled back on it a bit.\u00a0 Given a gasp of oxygen, the smoke leapt out as flames.\u00a0 We ran to get the fire extinguisher on the side of the combine.\u00a0 We don\u2019t extinguish many fires, and there were a couple frantic seconds figuring that out.<\/p>\n
Inside that compartment was a perfect combustible blend of oil, grease, and corn dust.\u00a0 Unfortunately, we couldn\u2019t spray the fire without getting the panel off.\u00a0 One by one I removed the bolts on my knees getting a face full of smoke, dust, and extinguisher retardant as Jay sprayed the newly freed fire leaping out into the air<\/p>\n
It was briefly exciting.\u00a0 In seconds that seemed like hours, the flames were out as smoke continued to billow.\u00a0 If, this a large \u201cif,\u201d we didn\u2019t have that fire extinguisher, I\u2019m not sure how the story ends.\u00a0 It was windy, and a hundred acres of dead corn plants might have given that fire a mind of its own.<\/p>\n
We had several days of Red Flag Warnings this fall.\u00a0 Those are increasingly common: dry wind and extreme low humidity at the time of year when everything green has turned into potential tinder.\u00a0 Combine fires are not uncommon, each of them being a combustible vessel of grain dust and petroleum products.<\/p>\n
Our situation was not apparently dangerous, although there were enough ingredients to make it so.\u00a0 It was reminder that there are hazards in working with machines and nature.\u00a0 Lots of jobs around here, not just farming, are so defined.\u00a0 An increased emphasis on safety and better equipment during my career make things better.\u00a0 But danger remains.<\/p>\n
We drove the combine to the yard where I took a hose to the smoking parts.\u00a0 The water was met with hissing and more smoke, and finally just dripping.\u00a0 Our attention turned to back to the task at hand: harvest.\u00a0 I called Miller Sellner Implement to let them know we were bringing in our disabled machine.<\/p>\n
We were met by Laverne Krzmarzick and Cole Krzmarzick who ascertained that a bearing going out had caused sparks leading to fire.\u00a0 A half day in the shop would get us going with some repairs to be completed later.\u00a0 They were joined later by Clint Krzmarzick and Carter Krzmarzick.\u00a0 Every customer at Miller Sellner gets great service, but I figure it doesn\u2019t hurt to have my surname.<\/p>\n
My other story involves less danger and more embarrassment.\u00a0 Promise not to laugh.<\/p>\n
I was racing to finish corn before our October snowstorm, working alone with ten acres to go.\u00a0 To get done quicker, I was going to haul these last loads to nearby Central Region elevator.\u00a0 Heavy snow was forecast late in the day, but flakes began falling in the morning as I started combining.<\/p>\n
I filled my two wagons and jumped from the combine to the tractor.\u00a0 I drove the first wagon to the elevator in increasing snow.\u00a0 As I unloaded, I heard other farmers were quitting.\u00a0 Snow on corn plants can plug up a combine\u2019s innards.<\/p>\n
Getting home with the empty wagon, I jumped in the combine to drive it home and into the shed.\u00a0 Then I ran to cover things up by the bins.\u00a0 Now it was full-out snowing, and I ran back to the field to take the other wagon to the elevator.\u00a0 That was the plan.<\/p>\n
When I pulled off the scale, Jay (a different Jay) waved me to the number two pit, which wasn\u2019t normal.\u00a0 I climbed off the tractor and Jay said the sample came out weird and we would have to recheck it.\u00a0 He turned to unload my wagon.<\/p>\n
My empty wagon.\u00a0 My mind spun briefly, wondering where my corn had gone.\u00a0 OH!\u00a0 It hit me.\u00a0 I forgot to switch wagons back in the field and hauled the empty wagon back into town.<\/p>\n
\u201cUm, that\u2019s imaginary corn,\u201d I said cringing.\u00a0 \u201cI heard the price for imaginary corn was up today.\u201d\u00a0 I was scrambling to not look dumb. \u00a0At this age, I regularly misplace things like phone and wrenches.\u00a0 But not 400 bushels of corn.\u00a0 It was a senior moment, writ large.<\/p>\n
Oh well, any time you can get out of harvest with the people and the machines mostly intact, you have to be thankful.\u00a0 Thanksgiving Day is timed perfectly in that way.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
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I was talking to Dale, a former farm kid.\u00a0 I was telling him how harvest was going.\u00a0 Dale tolerated me a while, and then said, \u201cYou corn and bean farmers.\u00a0 You\u2019ve got about as much to do as me mowing my lawn.\u00a0 You get your machinery out a few times a year like I get …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[162],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weeds-by-randy-krzmarzick"],"aioseo_notices":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-24 03:20:54","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120822"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120822\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120823,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120822\/revisions\/120823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}