A glimpse into the past:
The man in the photo is my father-in-law. He left us a year ago this week, passing away on his birthday! We miss his stories of old-time farming.......he did fieldwork with horses when he was a boy and milked cows by hand.
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Here's a story from Sunday's Waterloo Courier, about an area farmer who still picks ear corn. The first photo in the story is cool.......it shows ears of corn shooting out of a cornpicker into a wagon.
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8 comments:
Farmwife,
Great picture of a real farmer.
Explain something to a city dweller. The man collects his corn on the ear, he then simply grinds up the whole thing and feeds it to the cows. This, I think I got from the story, is
better "roughage" for the cows by what seemed like a lot. So how do all the other farmers add that back in?
I am easily confused by farm life, obviously. One of the things I never have gotten to in my Forrest "Gumpish" life.
Two other things: The Butterfly Theory is in fact the most intersting part of Chaos. It amazes me that a butterfly's wings can move or prevent a tornado for example. Second, I threw two of my travel pieces from this year up on the blog so it is technically alive again.
Thanks again for the picture of you father-in-law. It must have been a wonderful but hard life.
Great photo. It conveys a lot of character.
Warm thoughts to you and your husband. I know the anniversaries of deaths can be hard.
Just out blog hopping and I found my way to you. I too am a farmers wife and I especially like reading about the things going on at other peoples farms! I hope you will stop by and leave me a comment so I know you were there!
Hi,Reamus,
I'm glad you followed the link to the newspaper story. I had been wishing to have a photo of a corn picker to show on the blog.
Yes, we used to harvest corn on the ear and store it in a wooden corn crib. We would grind the ears whole.....yes, it was good roughage for the cows. In early September each year, we chop much of our corn acreage for silage, which includes the whole corn plant, stalk, ears and all. That is very good roughage for the cows, as is hay. It is amazing the volume of food a cow eats every day. As you can guess.....a large volume comes out the other end too, each day.
I'm confused about many aspects of life beyond my little world, too.
In thinking of the Butterfly Effect.....perhaps we were lacking in butterflies back in May when the tornado went through a couple miles away from here. OR......maybe we DID have butterflies operating right here and that's why the tornado missed us by a couple miles. Fascinating to contemplate.
Am off to visit your blog.
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Hi, Ruth,
Thank you for the caring comment. Last Thanksgiving was the last time my father-in-law was here at our house......he ended up in the hospital the next day and passed away a few days later. Hard to believe its been a year already.
Hi, Farmchick,
Thank you for stopping by and commenting! Yes, I will visit your place and leave a footprint so you know I was there!
Who knew there were different ways to harvest corn?! I didn't even think about how corn was harvested. In the South San Joaquin Valley, the corn is used as "green chop" for cattle feed. Thanks for the off beat info.
Hi, Maybelline,
I've heard the guys use that term, "green chop", around here, too. Usually, in reference to forage crops that are chopped green, obviously. Sometimes, later in the summer, Husband will green chop some corn for the cows if we're running low on silage.
Thanks for stopping by!
A lovely photograph Jeannelle. I'm sure the holidays are a bittersweet time for you and your family. It is always tough when family deaths occur around holidays. Still I'm sure there are many wonderful memories and family get togethers are fine times to relate them. Many blessings to you and yours this holiday.
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