A rapid pace harvest continues

The scurs and Weather Eye conveyed more warm sun and dry interspersed with reminders that fall is truly here, sometimes. Does summer finally relent and let Jack Frost in the door or are we looking at another week of July? Starting on Thursday, sunny with highs in the low 80’s and lows in the upper 50’s. Partly sunny on Friday with highs in the upper 70’s and lows in the mid-40’s. Mostly sunny on Saturday with highs in the upper 60’s with lows in the mid-40’s. Sunday, mostly sunny with highs in the low 60’s and lows in the mid-30’s. Sunny on Columbus Day with highs in the low 60’s and lows in the upper 30’s. Tuesday sunny with highs in the upper 60’s and lows in the low 40’s. Partly sunny on Wednesday with highs in the upper 60’s and lows in the mid-50’s. The sun will set on Columbus Day at 6:30 p.m. On the 16th, sunrise won’t occur until 7:30 a.m. and daylight slips below 11 hours. We won’t see that much again until February 26th. The normal high for October 16th is 59 and the normal low is 37. The scurs are content to avoid building snowmen for a few months. Then it can warm up again.

 

A steady, rapid harvest pace continued this past week. The dry, generally warmer than normal conditions continue to allow farmers to harvest almost at will. When they run into a field that’s too wet, they move to another one, harvest that and return within a few days to finish the field that was wet. There are still some patches of replant soybeans scattered around, but even some of those disappeared recently. There was some evidence of frost in places last week when temps dipped to 38 in some of those replant areas. Soybean leaves wee noticed dying by Betsy’s dad and I had noted the same thing that afternoon. There was more widespread frost Monday morning, but certainly not what would qualify as a killing frost. Soybeans have been running about as anticipated with a few fields yielding impressively, but most not so much. Ditto with corn. Moisture in corn has been reported as low as the lower teens. Yields have been all over the board with most disappointed, but not surprised. Rain only makes grain when it stays above water most of the growing season.

 

The garden is moving towards the end of the season. Mrs. Cheviot picked and grouped the pumpkins, squash and gourds into piles, so they can be retrieved for decorating purposes. While not on a par with last year, one still has to be impressed that we got anything given the late planting date. The wet soil didn’t do any favors for establishment of any of the vine crops. Like the field crops, additional plantings had to be made. There are some winter radishes that made it and they’ll be ready to harvest anytime. Since they were thinned by the August downpours, they are huge. There are also a couple rows of snap peas that made it. Sampling a few recently, will have to water them some to see if we can coax a few more on the vines. Fall snap peas are a special treat. Given the cool temps, they seem to be even sweeter than their spring planted counterparts. If the weather holds and time allows, it would be nice to work the garden up this fall, so it will be in better shape for next spring than this year’s edition was.

 

Afraid it’s time to throw in the towel on the hummingbirds at the ranch and take down their feeders. There’s been no visual evidence of them since September 27th and no sign that anything has consumed any of the last batch of sugar water. With the warm fall, there are still ample amounts of flowers around our yard yet, so not to worry. Once the nectar feeders come down, the suet feeders will replace them until next April or May. In the meantime, there are starting to be a few more goldfinches frequenting the thistle feeders. The usual suspects are busy at the sunflower feeders, namely blue jays, chickadees, nuthatches and red-bellied woodpeckers. The cardinals have been more secretive as of late, but they’ll emerge soon enough when the time is right. There are still lots of migrating robins coming through. The nannyberry crop was exceptional, and they’ve wasted little time capitalizing on it, judging by the number of pits emptied daily from the birdbath.

 

We were able to get a fall cruise in with the car club this past weekend to Red Wing. Pretty drive and the contrast in crops vs. what we’ve seen locally was painfully obvious. Corn was even, still green and in some cases still being chopped for silage. A little early for leaf watching, but in another 10 days, they should be at their peak. My copilot and I take turns driving on an every-other-year basis, so this year it was my turn again. The Studebaker was up to the challenge after the gas tank was replaced. The old one was leaking around the outlet. Inside, the bottom was extremely rusty, likely the original now 65-year-old gas tank. When one buys a reman part, you have to hope it’s an adequate replacement. This one was and held the same 18 gallons of gas as the original. We weren’t sure how much was in it, so we needed to get some gas before venturing forth. We put 16.6 gallons in. My crack Studebaker mechanic told me there’s about a half-gallon of gas still left in the tank when the gauge reads empty. That’s cutting it pretty close. The good news is the gas gauge still works almost perfectly.

 

The Silver Hawk draws a lot of attention anytime we take it out for a cruise and this one was no exception. When we came out of the hotel, the shuttle driver asked where we wanted to go in the parking lot. We told him the handicapped area behind the fence. “By the Studebaker?” he asked. Why sure! The young lad liked all the old cars our group was driving and was keeping an eye on them. When fueling up to come home, there was an older gentleman who once had a Golden Hawk and, like most Studebaker owners, rued the day he’d sold it. When he got it up over 100 mph, he claimed it started becoming light in the front end and felt like it was going to fly just like a hawk! Even when I got back to Bugtussle and dropped my copilot off, I was approached by a lady who was fascinated by the car. Had never seen a Silver Hawk before. She took several pictures as I was filling it with gas for the next run. Hopefully the photos doesn’t wreak havoc with my enrollment in the witness protection program.  

 

As I wrote last week, Poppy has been a ranch resident for two years now as of October 8th. Her tenure here has been mostly enjoyable even though the bar was set pretty high. It’s taken us a while to realize she’s a Corgi and not a Border Collie and that it’s fine that she isn’t. Someday we’ll get used to her dawdling and we’re still waiting for her to outgrow some of her puppy habits. Recently, Mrs. Cheviot had tossed a small, older blanket that had some of Poppy’s trademark chewing on it. That happened quite some time ago, so we were confident that perhaps we were past that stage. The blanket was replaced with a new model, and everyone was happy for a few days. When I came home from work one night, Poppy had been up to her old tricks and initiated the new blanket by chewing a hunk off the bottom. And this is why we can’t have nice things.

 

See you next week…real good then.