Okay, time for aother update for the western, Ohio area.

Soybeans are looking excellent. Lots of good growth and pods developing nicely. Have seen a lot of 4 bean pods. Still early in the development stage, but have good soil moisture to fill them out. They will be later than normal, but barring an early frost, should do very well. Have had nice timely rains since end of July. Cooler temperatures during polination really helped.

Bad news is my dog tested positive for heartworms and is now in treatment for that. Took him in yesterday morning for the 2 day treatment and will bring him home this afternoon. We seem to have caught it early and so far has had no adverse symptoms and still very active.

Gene

Well, the combines have finally started in Central Ohio. I flew about 85 miles to the east over central Ohio yesterday, Oct.8, and saw beans being run north of Columbus area. Today saw a few running close to my area in west central part of the state. Still see lots of yellow and green in the soybeans. Some corn has been run, but only in scattered areas. Many are still cutting silage.

This past week was ideal weather with temps in the mid 70's. Lots of hay made this week. I cut and baled my 4th. cutting. Was light, but very nice quality alfalfa.

Clear weather forecast good through Wednesday with chance of rain for Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Figures about right as this is the days for  the Portland swap meet.

Gene

Scenery will change rapidly now in WNY.  We finally accomplished our first hard freeze last night and this morning.  It occurred somewhat late this year.  Color change in the leaves has been slow to happen as many trees still carry mostly green leaves.  A large Norway Maple in my yard that is normally full color and dropping by now is still in summer green.  I suspect after this frost all of the leaves from the top 1/3 of this tree will hit the grouond with a burnt green color.

Rain, rain, and more rain.  Very wet conditions here with standing water in places.  On a trip to the orthopedic office yesterday in pouring rain, I did notice that a couple hundred acres of soybeans disappeared from the field during the last two days of rain.  Two very large combines were parked in the barren field just around the corner from our house.  Appearently soy beans are not affected by humitity and rain as grain crops are.  These conditions probably result in less dust in the air during harvest.    It appears the the area soy bean harvest is about 50% done with the other half still standing.  Many acres of dry corn still stand in the fields, which is not uncommon.  Many growers wait until the ground is frozen before going in to pick or combine.  Not uncommon to see it done here with snow on the ground and on the corn stalks.  Often corn is being harvested during deer season which is the last half of November in this area.

I noticed a strange crop of green oats in full head this week.  With spring outs usually being ripe and harvested in july and perhaps early August, the green field caught my attention.  I am mystified, unless it will be cut green for cattle feed.  I have planted oats for the purpose of turning them back under to enrich clay soil, but I understood the time to plow the oats under for most benefit is just before they stalked, thereby takiing less nutrients from the soil to grow them.

It seems that is about all that is happening in this area except that many lawns are still being mowed and there is no shortage of PU trucks pulling trailers down the road with two and three zero turn mowers aboard.  Yup.  Strange year.  I am thinking it may not be a bad idea to mount the snow plow on the 4x4 any time now.  I see no hope of going out to hunt during deer season next month due to health issues, so the truck may as well be ready in case of an early storm.  Stranger things have happened.

Charlie V.

Ohio is still very wet. I tried to run soybeans on Tuesday, but ground is too wet and soft, just couldn't go. Got 61 bushels off. Parked the combine by the barn when I quit and as soon as I throttled it down, the combine stalled the engine. Turns out that a bearing in the variable speed unit had failed. Lucky I was by the barn on the grass to work on it. Worked most of the last 3 days working on it. Got it back together yesterday evening. Just have to tighten the bolts in the main shield.

Had our first hard frost yesterday and this morning. 32 this morning. Fire and coffee are both nice this morning. Our leaves started turning 2 weeks ago. With all the excess moisture this fall, the colors were very pretty. Flew over the area 2 weeks ago and saw a lot of yellow and red. Maples in the lawn are slowly dropping leaves, especially in strong winds. Oak trees hang on much longer, some till late winter. Ash and hackberry leaves are long gone.

Been cutting firewood and have an impressive pile at the barn with more cut in the woods to be split and hauled. Will be warm and cozy this winter.

The rain washed soybean straw across my airstrip and spent last sunday clearing that off. Had 6 loads in my 3/4 yard dump trailer that I hauled to a brush pile in the woods. Was a full day project.

Crops are coming off slowly. Lots of soybeans too late to be harvested before the rains set in. Probably only 30 to 40 percent harvested. Very little conr being shelled. Much of it is still green, some were still chopping silage before the hard rain.

Lawn mowing has finally slowed down. Cool weather has given a reprieve to that. Likely won't have to mow again this fall. No snow in the forecast for next 10 days, but chance of rain by mid week. Need about 5 dry, warm and windy days to dry the ground.

Well Gene I hope you are missing out on that snow that is hitting the northeast according to the weather network. I bet Charlie is able to try out his snowplow by now. That snow can't be good for any crops still in the field. My combines have been put away in the sheds for a couple of weeks or so now and I'm glad of it. We finished up hauling the last flax straw bales today taking advantage of the continuing nice weather. Of course "nice" is a relative term seeing as we barely saw 40 degrees today.

Ralph;

No snow in Ohio and none forecast for the 10 day forecast. With the saturated ground and getting only 2 or 3 days between rains we are not gaining much on the water.  Rain forecast for Monday and again on Thursday and Friday. Fall tillage has been non existant the past 2 weeks.

Nice weather here would be any day without rain and with sunshine. Temp is unimportant. Can dress for the low temps.

Gene

Ditto to Gene here, Ralph.  I guess I can say we are blessed with not a flake of snow.  Not too many miles to our South and East is another story.  On the Radar scan early last night it appeared that Ithica NY was the NW edge of the main storm getting National attention.  Ithica is probably 60-65 miles from here, but trail out of snow may have been as near as 25 miles to our SE.  We are again down to 26 deg.F this AM, so it is surly cold enough.  Even on Friday night some areas in the Bristol Hills 20 miles south of here accumulated six inches of snow from what was getting here as rain, so that is close enough.  If the sun warms the air today it would be good to do some mowing.  The rest of the story is the ground is most likely too wet and soft to be driving around on so I will just keep admiring a good stand of grass.

Charlie V.

Ohio has finally gotten some typical cool, dry fall weather. Only about 1/2 inch total for the past week. Combines are running day and night, especially in corn where the ground is firmer. Some beans are being run, usually 1 day at a time and then only on firmer ground. Rains coming reegularly every 3 days, just enough to keep the pods tough. crop moisture finally down to 13 percent yesterday.

I have run about 16 of my 20 acres and leaving ruts where I could run. Couldn't run the higher clay ground at all. Lower black ground I could run in most areas. Yield is a little less than I expected at about 45 bushels. Checked the ground behind the combine and saw very little loss, so guess they just aren't there. Sure a lot of straw though. We have had a couple nice drying days now. Nice warm sunshine yesterday and a strong north east wind last night and today, so hopefully the ground has dried enough to finish this weekend. Two good hours should finish. More rain forecast for Monday through Thursday.

Only one breakdown of consequence. Week from last Tuesday I lost a bearing in the variable speed driven unit on the transmission. Fortunately it siezed up after I parked it on the grass at the barnyard, so didn't have to waller in the mud to repair it. Took 3 days to repair it and get it going again, but didn't lose any field time because of the rain, so was actually a good time to fix it and a couple other niusance items.

Gene

Nov. 14, 2011;

Good news, bad news.

Good news is I finished combining the beans on Nov. 6, and finished plowing on Nov. 13. Feel good about that.

Bad news it that there are still a lot of crops in the fields and about 3.5 inches of rain this morning and severe thunderstorms and hail this evening has really soaked the ground again. Lots of runoff and localized flooding in fields. Won't be any combining the rest of this week. Saw combines standing in water this morning and worse now. Saw a truck with an empty header cart stuck in the mud and the combine with a 36 foot head in water to the rims. No freezing weather in the forecast to help firm up the ground.

Gene

Good news and bad news are better than no news at all, Gene.  Thanks for the update.  Very wet here also, although not as bad as you describe.  I still see standing corn and soybeans but many fields are harvested now.  I would guess about 25% still standing around here. I also notice some fields with substantial tire rutting from the machines and ruts full of water.  Some fall plowing has been done.  Our above normal temperature spell is now ending for a few days so that may bring dryer weather.  I suspect most of the wet ground around will have to freeze dry at this point, or be wet until spring.  

I hope everyone reading has a great Thanksgiving next week.

Charlie V.

Well its not at all wet here. At 0 degrees F every bit of moisture is frozen solid tonight . Just had our first blizzard last night and I have had my share of exercise shining up the snow shovels this afternoon. Happy thanksgiving to you guys in the south. We have ours a month early.

Thankfully, winter hasn't arrived here in Ohio yet. Lowest temp so far has been 27F. Been windy most days with 15 to 20 mph winds. No freezing temps in the 10 day forecast.

Wet ground still has the soybean harvest on hold, but the corn harvest resumed yesterday around the area. Saw several combines running and trucks traveling the roads. More rain forecast for 3 days first of the week. Not much fall tillage being done. Very little wheat has been planted.

Gene

A couple of shots of our first attempt at Winter.  This is enough to last me at least until the first of next year, but it probably will not work out that way.  The lowest thermometer readings here is about 22 Deg F.  Locations 20-40 miles south saw 3-5 inches of snow.  50 miles SW had a couple of localized tornadoes that flattened some buildings. We skinned by with some thunder and lightning, but even that was not right overhead.  I am sure Gene will agree with me that we are very willing to allow Ralph to be the "cold king" of the forum.

By the way, Ralph, did you get the Craig's list ad that I sent for a Farmall Super MD converted to gas with a Chrysler V-8 and two transmissions?  





Charlie V

Charlie;

Not ready for the white stuff here yet, though we did have a light covering of hailstones last Monday night. Was warm enough to melt very fast though. Lots of lightning and thunder and strong winds as a strong cold front passed through.

Have had pretty persistent south winds for most of the week. Made my job of cleaning up the leaves yesterday since the field I take them to is north of the lawn and barnyard. Did a little experiment with the hayrake to try to rake them. That got the bulk of them into a windrow, but left too many behind. I bought a backpack leaf blower at Portland last spring. After some fresh gas and a little fine tuning, I was finally able to get it running good enough to blow the leaves into a couple big piles. Then I got my 12'X20' tarp and used that to drag them out into the plowed field to burn. Trees are nice, but why do they have to aggravate us with the leaf mess?

This makes my 199th post, so have to make another one to pass the 200 benchmark.

Gene

Well its not at all wet here. At 0 degrees F every bit of moisture is frozen solid tonight . Just had our first blizzard last night and I have had my share of exercise shining up the snow shovels this afternoon. Happy thanksgiving to you guys in the south. We have ours a month early.

Ralph;

Checking your weather, it looks like you have some of the coldest weather around. Checked the Regina weather at 6:00 am and showed you at-6F and now at 8:30 pm you are already at 0 F and even with a south wind. Hope the wind doesn't change.

We are at 52 here right now and actually warmer than Spencer has it in N.Carolina at 44 degrees.

Okay, I have my 200th post so will be quiet for now.

Gene