The Massey

[KSQ2]

Called in the big guns this evening to get our 10 acre field ready for the alfalfa planting — my father-in-law LOVES to fire up big green. He doesn’t get in the field as much these days since they began to share crop their ag ground. It has been 11 years since this ground has been worked, the cash renter exclusively no-tills, almost to a fault. We had to smooth out a few areas that have washed some.
The ground looks great, the coop said it doesn’t need any inputs until fall. We did have to put down about 16 tons of ag lime.


I need to wait a couple days and harrow it, to really smooth it out.

 

[KSQ2]

The persimmons are finally beginning to catch up with the chestnuts in the bareroot potted experiment.

 

[KSQ2]

Got the 10 acres harrowed this evening. We’ll see if it passes the father-in-law test tomorrow. I left the harrow at the edge of the field, just in case. Lol

 

[KSQ2]

One of the first big parts orders came in. This is hardware for the swather/conditioner, and plumbing parts for the 3 point boom sprayer. I’ll post up a couple pics of them when we go to work on em. I hope this alfalfa project is successful, talk a little a lot of upfront investment, relatively speaking of course.

Speaking of the alfalfa I hope we get the rain this weekend to pack the ground some and prep it for planting, but hopefully it doesn’t come too fast, the 10 acres looks pretty vulnerable right now.

 

[T-Max]

I love Shoup! Have another order coming in today. I rebuilt my corn planter almost entirely through them.

 

[KSQ2]

All of the chestnut bare roots have awakened now, along with 2 of the persimmons. So far the experiment is going well. I’m dipping the pots once a week and keeping them out of the downpours we’ve been getting some of lately.

The most awake persimmon.

 

[KSQ2]

Also, it’s beginning to look like we’re not going to hit our window for alfalfa planting. There is still a small chance, but it’s not looking likely; and trust me, I’m NOT complaining, the rain has been wonderful! We really wanted to make a profit this year for tax purposes, and there is now a plan B. We’re looking at planting teff grass for a hay crop. It’s an annual and there is little to no chance for reseeding. Since it’s a warm season grass, we’re still a couple weeks from the beginning of the planting window. Our seed supplier said it would also make a great bed to no-till the alfalfa into this fall. If we can get at least 2 cuttings, we could stand to make a little bit of a profit, teff grass hay is pretty highly coveted around here. We plan to just pay to have it round baled; it wouldn’t be worth the effort to square bale it as opposed to alfalfa. One last plus is the cost of seed, it will be no more than the cost of oats as a cover crop.