Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Tobacco Stalks

I haven't gotten to take any pics of taking the tobacco down from the shed, or of stripping the leaves off yet this year....I will get some the next time we take some down. I did however get some pics of pulling the stalks off the lath.

Here the leaves are in 30 lbs bundles, the stalks and lath are piled behind the bundles.


Ed Sr. feeds the lath with stalks through the Lath Puller.



Two rolls pull the lath through the headboard leavin the stalks on a shelf.




The lath are tied into buldes of about 50 and piled in the corner of the shed for next years use.
The stalks are piled into a wagon and will be spread out on pasture and corn fields.

The white circles in the pics are the camera capturing the flash reflecting off all the dust in the air.

One shed done....two more to go!



Gene

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Cooling Down

Well this is certainly a day to see the frost on the pumpkin………that is IF we had any pumpkins! Some crops did sooooo well and others not so much! Even our “pup” Diesel didn’t want to crawl out of bed to get a biscuit! That is saying something. It’s definitely turning cold now and it will make it much harder for the guys to strip the tobacco. Even being in the shed with some protection after the sun goes down it gets cold very fast.
The geese are flying south but also finding some of the fields to make a stopover and the gun fire is abundant. First thing in the morning you can hear the shots being fired. Several farms around us must have them set to go off!
My windshield needed scraping this morning too! I am not ready for cold weather! I would have liked a few more weeks of 45-50 degree weather but I think we are in for some pretty low temperatures now. I guess that means the turnips will be much sweeter this year! Jean brought out his coveralls and so the season goes on!
On our farm the work doesn’t stop because the season is over! Now some of the other work begins. This weekend sweet corn was cooked and packaged for the freezer. The sheds will house some of the tractors as the tobacco is stripped and bundled. The stalks will be put out in the fields to go back in the ground from where it came.
At home our Oak trees are sharing their abundance with us too! Lots of acorns and many, many leaves to cover the ground…….now of course we expect the rain because each year we have not been able to rake or pick up the leaves due to continual rain! Let’s hope we can get some of them up!


Chris