Crop Tour 2011

Every year, our county agent puts together a crop tour in which a bunch of farmers get on the Senior Citizens' bus and drive all over the county looking at test plots, new varieties of grains that are being planted by progressive farmers, crops that were SUPPOSED to look good but don't for one reason or another, and range.

For several years, my friend Anne (who also happens to be the county agent's lovely wife) and I were the only girls on the crop tour.  We joked about it and started calling ourselves Foxtail and Kochia, two weeds that farmers hate to see in their fields. 

Here's Foxie and the little Foxtailettes....they were NOT impressed with the whole idea.  The Foxtailettes, I mean, not Foxtail herself. 

They took off early in the tour, because it was naptime and there was zero tolerance for standing around looking at wheat.

This picture just makes me smile, and I put it in for a Nana in England who misses these babies!

This is the first stop on the tour, here at Langs Fork, Inc., where we had a test plot of different kinds of winter wheat.  It didn't turn out well, due to a combination of the wrong seeding rate and lack of fertilizer...the spring was just too wet to get it applied.  My father-in-law is very disgusted with the way it turned out, so if you see him on the street, please don't mention that you saw these pictures on the Chronicles.  Thank you.

To look at the berries, the guys take a head of wheat and roll it around in between their palms, tearing off all the chaff and beard, blow it out and then they can see how full or heavy the wheat is and all sorts of other things. 

Our county agent discussing some of the reasons the wheat looks so bad in this test plot, and how the diseases like tan spot and rust don't overwinter here in Eastern Montana, but that they blow in every spring from the East.  Thanks, North Dakota!

The father-in-law that you didn't see in my blog, picking a head of wheat that you didn't see in my blog....

Here we are at Rod Lawrence's field....gorgeous stand of winter wheat!  *insert "Ooooo! Aaaahhh!"

Two professionals, checking out the varieties that were planted side by side.  If you want to learn a lot about farming, stick close to these guys...

Stinkin' grasshopper on Rod's beautiful wheat!

Taken out of my window, because I'm doing a challenge with my friend Patricia about scenes from windows. I love rear view mirror pictures...something about seeing ahead and behind, all at the same time, that intrigues me.

Peas that are READY to be cut!  I want to say these were Randy Brusett's peas, but I may have that wrong. ***They were Rod Lawrence's peas! The editor extends deepest apologies...*** I was always the last to the field and taking pictures, so I missed some of the finer points of the information...like whose crop it was and what the planting rate was.  Drats.

Stomping around in the pea field...

Oh!  Here's richness!  Check out the hay bales!  My cousin John went into the haying business this year and what a way to start....they aren't all in this picture, but a little over 7000 bales.  Big bales. So...if you need hay, let me know and I'll put you in touch with him!

We then drove something like 20 miles to the next wheat...Jeremy Watt's.  He lives in country that is closer to the Fort Peck lake and it's completely different farming, there. 

And here's HIS wheat.  Pretty, hm?  I want to say it was spring wheat, but again, I may be wrong....

The country is beautiful...

Lots of little prairie potholes with water in them, so there's more water fowl than normal...

I just liked the looks of this old hill.

We were SHOCKED to see longhorns on our way back to town!  What in the world...? 

Goofy horned!

 A Garfield County crop tour takes about 5-6 hours and covers an incredible amount of miles!

(I'll check with the agent to see how many we did that afternoon....)