Here we are again in Pond Creek

We have now moved up from Southern Oklahoma to Northern Oklahoma. I tried to update the blog since we moved but the signal has been too poor for my internet connection to hold very long. So today after dropping lunch off at the field I buzzed down to the Enid, OK library (about 30 minutes south of us) to get the blog updated and catch up on emails. It has been a week since the last post and I have a lot of pictures so this will be a long one! Let me go back to last week and get you caught up....

We had to take pictures of the Texas border signs, since we saw them so often for a while there.

A nice evening in the field.

Dan got a hair cut before going to the field one morning. Most of the rest of the guys got haircuts on this past Sunday night.

On Tuesday morning Marg & I went to see one of the farmers load cattle. There were cattle trailers lined all up the hill ready to load!

Todd along with his 2 boys, neighbors, and some day workers rounded all the steers up from the big pasture to the corral.

Todd's 2 boys along with a neighbor boy helping out. I asked them what time they had gotten up that morning. 4am they said! And they want to be out there helping, they get upset if their Dad leaves without them in the morning their Grandpa said.

Our clothesline at our 1st stop! It saved a lot of money, here in Pond Creek there isn't an area to hang up a clothesline. When it is good weather and the guys are all out in the fields I do all the laundry. When we have rain days the guys will do their own laundry, we haven't had any rain days yet..... I do 12-15 loads of clothes every 5-6 days depending on size of the washers. Then I do towels and sheets another day.

Holly working on getting the paperwork done for the farmers. Our guys give me the grain cart scale logs, the truck logs, and the elevator tickets so that I can sort out all the bushels per field to get the bushels per acre. The farmers really appreciate getting the sheet from us that have the breakdown of how each field performed. We cut 2640 acres and the overall averge was 39.85 bu/acre in Southern Oklahoma. There were fields with averages up to 57 bu/acre, but there were a lot in the 30 bu/acre range as well.

Supper in the field - grilled brats, beans, chips, watermelon, brownies and ice cream.

All 4 combines working - its a beautiful thing!

Lt Dan, Jon, and Andy looking spiffy for work!

The stop signs are really short in the country here, not sure why.

A VERY WINDY day.

Jon, Winston, & Lt. Dan

I love this picture

Dan & Jake - these guys are always so positive, we really appreciate their good attitudes!

Jacob! Jon & I met up with all the farmers to settle up on Thursday and Friday morning that we cut for in S. Oklahoma. The guys loaded up the machinery and we were leaving by about noon on Friday the 25th to head up to Pond Creek, OK. It was about 5 hours away. When we got there some of the guys were able to start combining right away. The other guys helped me at the RV park to get hooked up. It is much fuller than last year, there were some harvesters there already and several people that work with the oil drilling. We barely fit our 2 campers in. Then we had some problems with the hookups, some of the electrical hookups didn't work. Luckily Lt. Dan worked in construction for a while and was able to redo them so they worked for us! After 2 hours of messing around with everything we were finally completely hooked up. We are VERY close to several other campers.....and a railroad track. It goes by several times each day and a couple times at night. There are roads a block on either side of the campers which means they have to blow the horns on either side of us as well, and it is LOUD! Some of the guys went to bed early since they were going back for the 3rd and 4th combines the next day. On Saturday morning at 2am Andy, Lt. Dan, Charlie, and Jake got up to head back south to get the other combines and heads. They got back in the early afternoon. Jake's mom Cindy, brother Erich, and uncle Paul came to visit us that weekend as well! They got to the camper about noon on Saturday. When we went out to the field Erich got right to unchaining the combines from the trailers that had just rolled in. We didn't even ask him to!

Erich helped Charlie & Andy get the 2nd air conditioner installed in our camper. Jake's family enjoyed riding with everyone in the combines and tractor and we really enjoyed their company! On Sunday 1/2 of us wanted to go to church and the other 1/2 of the guys said they would just go out to the field to get started. The farmer we cut for now has 1 combine that he uses along with us. He had a bearing go out and there were some sparks going out the rear of his combine which started some straw on fire. He shut if off and got out of the way as did all of our guys and equipment. It was again very windy and the straw burns so quickly, but the fire department got there very quickly. It ended up that only straw burned (the wheat was already combined in that area) and it burned towards a corn field which of course is still green so luckily it stopped there. Cindy was riding along with Jake and later told me about the fire. She said it was good we were in church praying at the time, it could have been a whole lot worse but that she was impressed with how everyone handled it. There have been some storms go by us. We have seen some impressive clouds but have not had rain yet. There are chances of storms for us tonight and tomorrow I believe. Jon was interviewed today by Jerry from KDHL radio back home for updates on the wheat harvest. I think it will air tomorrow! Then later today a reporter from either a radio station or some kind of print media in Nebraska called Jon for an update as well. It was exciting. Well I sure feel good about finally being able to update the blog, now I better get back to grill chicken for supper.

Good Weather

Since we have been here the weather has been really nice. Now it is in the 80's and lower 90's during the days and it cools off nicely at night. It thundered this morning but only ended up sprinkling. The guys went to the field to fuel and grease up the machines then came back to the camper to eat breakfast for lunch or pancake palooza as I called it. We had 2 pounds of good bacon (from home) and 5 batches of from scratch pancakes with topping choices including butter, syrup, cutup strawberries and peaches, peanut butter, and plain or cinnamon applesauce. We took everything out to our big table outside and the guys devoured it before the flies had a chance. Then the guys left to go back out to the field to see if the moisture was down enough to get combining. While the guys were out in the field before lunch apparently Jake stepped on a snake and was freaking out until he realized it was dead, it was a bull snake and not a rattler, but the bull snakes have so much bacteria in their mouths that a person can get sick from it. He got a picture of it, but I do not have it to add here right now. The past few days have been hectic. I have driven to Duncan, Wichita Falls TX, and back to Greenville TX for more fuel filters and other parts in the past 3 days. We have had some good going times and then all of a sudden there are holdups on several of the machines. But we are fortunate to have a really good crew. Something happened yesterday that we have never encountered before. There was 1 of the heads left at a field that had been finished. The rest of the combines and equipment were moved and had started another field. Our guys were driving the grain trucks past that finished field so they would see the head on the trailer when they drove by. Dan went by it and noticed that the combine head was lying upside down on the ground. He stopped and called Jon. The trailer had not been moved and there was no storm to "blow" it off. We are guessing it was vandalism and was literally pushed off the trailer. Our guys got it turned back over, and somehow there was no damage. On Saturday night some of the guys did a little wild hog hunting before coming back to the camper. Andy shot a boar but they did not bring it back with them. Andy had eaten wild boar before and said it tasted like urine. So hopefully they get a female or a younger pig and they can roast it up so we can try it. There are a lot of hogs down here, and the farmers say: go for it! These guys are loving it.

Are You Kidding Me?

This has been said and thought a lot this week. After a perfect trip down here, things started to fall apart in short order on Monday afternoon. After lunch on Monday the guys all went back to the field to take a moisture sample. It was 12.4% so that was good enough to keep on combining, so Marg & I went out to the field. We saw this steer on the road.

Getting the machinery ready to roll in the field.

Notice how clean and red the combine is???

Lt. Dan, Jacob, & Caleb adding oil to the head and getting it ready.

2 combines start to open up the field while the others get hooked up.

The farmers son and a few of our guys watch the first round.

This was a longer, more narrow field, so we "cut" the field into smaller sections, so the grain cart doesn't have such a big area to cover.

Caleb - riding with Jon - getting familiar with this combine. Then Jon jumped out to deal with problems on 2 of the heads. Holly jumped in with Caleb to ride with him until he got more familiar with everything, he was doing a fine job though. Just a lot of things to know and remember in there.

Jon, assessing this head. Apparently one of the fingers broke off and was clanging around and the shaft in the auger was bent I think. The other head had a metal plate break off or crack on the end and needed to be welded. No problem, we have a welder along! But....we forgot the welding cables at the farm....are you kidding me?? Oh well, there was a farmer only a quarter mile up the road who's welder we could use. The head was already on the combine though and down here we can't get in or out of most fields because of the fences, so we have to take the heads off every time we move to another field, or in this case to go to the farmers yard. So load it back on the trailer and haul it up there. Not a big deal, just takes more time is all. I think they had to do some welding on this head as well.

One of the farmers and his wife were in the field for a while and they brought their dog, Chin Chin along. She was busy catching bugs and then Dan thought she looked thirsty so he offered her some water. Chin Chin is actually drinking out of the cap, but you can't tell very well in the picture. The combine that Andy was driving has a re-built engine in it. Watching it go around the field, we were noticing it puff out big clouds of black smoke and make a chugging noise every couple minutes or less even. Andy said it was running fine other than that so he just slowed the rpms down a little and it puffed black smoke less often at least. But that was going to need to be looked at very soon. Marg & I went back to the camper to make supper, the guys ate when they came in from the field, it was a late supper, eating about 9:30, it usually doesn't get that late to eat but obviously things weren't falling into place very well on Monday. Charlie & Kyle got to the camper first, a little after 9pm, in a rush, saying they needed to eat and shower quickly as they had to drive to Greenville, TX to get parts for one of the heads. So they were on the road by 9:45 or around there. It is a 2.5 hour drive to Greenville from here. That was Monday. On to Tuesday, May 15th. It was a heavy dew this morning so they got the 2 broken heads fixed and 3 of the combines ready for when it was dry enough. We ate an early lunch and they were able to start combining with 3 machines around 11:30 or noon. Andy, Caleb, and Kyle started off combining with Jacob I believe driving grain cart. Winston and Charlie drove trucks and Lt. Dan was helping Jon fix things.

2 service techs from the Case dealer came out to see what they could find on the combine that was puffing black smoke. Jon and our crew were thinking it was the fuel injectors. The techs hooked up thier computer to the combine and it did not find anything, so they also thought it was the injectors, but they did not have any with them, nor did their store in Wichita Falls have that kind in stock. The closest place that had them in stock was the warehouse in Greenville, TX. Are you kidding me? While Jon and the techs were looking at that combine, the combine that Caleb was driving just stopped suddenly. It wouldn't go forward or backwards. He took it out of gear and shifted it back into gear, it still wouldn't move. Jon & the techs went over to look at that combine. Well it seems like the tranny is out they thought......I know what you are thinking, are you kidding me? Lieutenant Dan says to me,"I can't believe all of these things are breaking. You can expect some things, but this is just one after another, and big breakdowns too." Yes it certainly is, and it deflates the spirit pretty quickly too.

Marg is talking to one of the farmers. We have been doing a lot of apologizing these past few days to the farmers for all of these hold ups and breakdowns. But they have been nothing but exceedingly gracious and encouraging. Todd just asks what he can help with and pitches right in. Raesh said to me,"You couldn't pay me to own a combine,I wouldn't want to deal with all those moving parts." and "If it was easy everyone would be custom harvesting and I would have harvesters knocking my door down to cut my wheat, but that isn't the case." We are so thankful for how wonderful these people are.

The 2 lone moving combines. But at least there ARE 2 moving combines!

Caleb and Lt. Dan have been tearing into the 2 down combines with Jon.

Jon, on the phone in his office trying to locate parts. The few case dealerships within 2 hours of us don't have what we need. And there are the Pro-Harvest trailers around, but they don't have the parts we need either, apparently our combines are too old....all four of them are from years 2003-2006. These combines are newer than all of our cars and trucks. So Marg & Holly got some fast food from Sonic for the guys and headed to Greenville, TX. We left at 6pm. It is about 2 and a 1/2 hours, but there was considerable road construction that slowed us down. We got there, got the parts, took a 30 minute detour, re-routed to 380 and got back to the camper at about 1:00am.

This restaurant made us laugh.

As did this sign. On the way through Bowie, TX headed back to the camper we saw 3 squad cars had a small pickup pulled over, they had the driver out, handcuffed, and were searching his truck. Wednesday morning came too fast. The guys headed out to the field and shortly thereafter Jon called me to give me some bad news. The fuel injectors that we picked up only hours before were the wrong ones. The warehouse had them ready for us, and even if we had opened the boxes we wouldn't have known they were the wrong ones anyways. Someone would have to go back there to get the correct ones. I almost cried. He offered if I wanted some of the guys to go instead, but I said they are more help to him with working on the machines than I am, so we will go back. As annoying as it is that we had to go back (3 trips in 3 days!) the worse thing is that the combine is still sitting idle. We packed a cooler with sandwich fixings to drop off at the field for the guys' lunch since we would be gone and headed back down the same roads we had just traveled a few hours ago. Jon, Lt. Dan, and Caleb were going to work as fast as they could on the other down combine to see if it really was the tranny or other parts so that when we were in Greenville we could hopefully get those parts too. After a couple hours Jon called that they were able to find the problem and he called in the parts. It was not the whole tranny! We got back with the parts in the early afternoon, sometimes thereafter we had 3 out of 4 combines running! Marg & I went back to start supper. Dan Melchert pulled in with Jon's car around 5:00 that evening, planting is finished! We made 4 batches of biscuits from scratch and sausage gravy to go with them. Loaded everything up and headed out to the field. When Jacob saw what was for supper he exclaimed,"I never thought we'd have biscuits and gravy in the field! maybe in the camper but not out here!" a little later Kyle walked up and said," I LOVE biscuits!!" Caleb said, "I will eat anything that anyone brings me." It felt so good to laugh that evening after the frustrating couple of days we had. I had intentions of getting to bed early that night, but by the time we got back to the camper, did all the dishes, and showered I think it was almost midnight by the time my head hit the pillow.

Jon, Lt. Dan, and Caleb You can't tell they were working hard, can you? Thursday, May 17th. Jon, Dan and Jacob worked on getting the old injectors out of the combine so they could put the new ones in. It was not going so well, they consulted with several people they knew until I think they unhooked some lines and they popped right out. Andy woke up in the middle of the night with a lot of pain in his eye. Regular eye drops made that eye burn. So he looked up some eye doctors in a town about a half hour away and Marg took him in right away for a 9:00 appointment. Holly stayed back at the camper and did 15 loads of laundry. This place is great because there is a laundromat in this RV park, the washers are kind of small, but I can walk there and not have to load up the car at least. Another bonus is that there are some big trees here too so we have 4 lines hung to dry clothes! It is about 100 steps for me from the washers to our clothesline. I only did the clothes and plan to do towels tomorrow. I hung everything out except for socks and underwear, there was a great breeze too so it dried quickly. I only had to pay for 3 loads in the dryers for the small stuff. It saved me $20 on drying at least. Andy & Marg got back around 10:30 I think. He got 2 bottles of drops for his eye. It turned out to be a viral infection.

Andy's eye is very sensitive to light right now and can't wear his contacts so he twisty tied his glasses and sunglasses together. Its a nice look I think, and he might get better reception with those antennas. We made BBQ pork sandwiches for lunch and took everything out to the field. Jon drove the 4th combine with the new injectors to the field we had moved too, YEAY!! Way to go Melchert Harvesting Pit Crew! You guys rock.

There is a Killdeer nest with 4 eggs in it only a few feet from the boys' camper. It is right on the crushed tar in the hot sun. I almost stepped on it but the mother bird came after me to warn me. I put 2 pails on either side of the nest they don't get stepped on or driven on. Hopefully they hatch soon! For Thursday's supper we made spaghetti and garlic bread. This time on our way to the field their were 2 steers in the road! 2 small turtles crossing the road and we saw a snake on the way to and from the field. Never know what you will see here.

Moving machinery to the next field.

This white truck pulled up by us and talked with Todd for a bit. I guess the 2 guys that were in the truck are on the show "Mudcats" and its filmed not far from here. They do noodling, but I have not seen that show at all, just what Todd told us.

The Dans. Young Dan opened his supper container and looked at the other guys' containers and said, "I like it that you don't discriminate food portions based on the size of the person, we all get equal amounts!" He keeps us laughing!