Living the dream

Tuesday, June 7, 2016

Is this a great country or what? If one wants to see how the seasons progress it is interesting to simply drive south across Kansas and Oklahoma. Three hundred miles south and the maturity of the crops about the equivalent to a month in time. When we left home last week a discerning eye showed just a touch of gold to the green waving wheat. Taller and better looking with big long heads it promises to be a better crop than we've seen in years. The farther south that we traveled the more golden did the fields appear. By mid-Oklahoma the crop looked almost ready to meet the combine. Finally this old farm kid, I cut my teeth in wheat harvest first running a combine in 1953, could no longer resist. I stopped the car and waded out into the hip high crop, plucking heads and shelling out the berries in my hand. It looked better from a distance and my small sample showed earlier drought, some shriveled berries but most yet plump and of course too high moisture to harvest but maybe 20 to 25 bushels per acre my guesstimate. And yes chewing a mouthful still made country kid wheat gum.

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