Weeds and Hot Weather

Warm weather and water make the cotton, and the weeds grow.

Can you see the dark flecks int eh furrows? Those are pig weed seedlings that sprouted because of the water from last week's irrigation. If we leave them alone they will be three feet tall in a month. So, we fired up the tractor...

and started cultivating the cotton.
   Both of these pictures are taken from the same spot in the field. I didn't move an inch. In the first picture I looked down at the weeds. In the second picture I looked up toward the tractor.You can see the stems at the top of the top picture are in the bottom of the bottom picture.
   We are running two passes of the tractor. In the first pass we use a rolling cultivator to loosen up the soil. For the second pass we use a fixed cultivator to shape the beds for the next irrigation in a week or so.

It got to 111F this week. Fortunately it has cooled off. The old hands tell you cotton likes heat. That is true up to a point. The plant is a lot like me, it shuts down at 95F. University studies show the stoma on the bottom of the cotton leaves actually shut down at 95 to protect the plant. Ideal temps for cotton are between 65 and 95. Below 65 the plants won't grow and above 95 the shut down. See, just like me, I operate better when it is warmer than 65 and cooler than 95.

I y'all have a great week.

P

Happy Father's Day!

Another busy week on the farm- mostly watering.

As you can see, the cotton has gotten a little taller since last week. The weather warmed up this week. I could finally use the pressure bomb to measure the plant's water use and it was just right. We have long been able to measure soil moisture, but the soil moisture is not as important as the condition of the plant. That makes sense doesn't it? There could be a situation where the soil was OK and the plants too wet or too dry. So researchers found a way to measure the plant moisture. It is called a pressure bomb. When we 'bomb' the cotton we know exactly what condition it is in and we can schedule our irrigation.
   Of course it is one thing to say you want to irrigate when you reach such and such a level. The hard part is having everything coordinated to get there- furrows have to be pulled, pipes laid and ditches put up. Experience and preparation are important. Seeing the big picture is important. We also have to finish this irrigation, cultivate the weeds again, twice, consider whether to spray for weeds and/ or fertilize again, before the plants need their next irrigation in a few weeks. Just because we got one irrigation right doesn't mean we can relax. We have to stay on our toes. Oh yeah we also need to keep checking for bugs to make sure they haven't moved in and started eating their way through the crop.

Here's the corn-

It's not "as high as an elephant's eye", but you can see it has grown quite a bit since the last photo. That is my shovel on the left to give you and idea of the size. I can't take a picture of myself with this camera to give you scale and Indy doesn't sit still very well. When we are checking fields he is wandering around looking for squirrels or something new to smell.
   Having Indy along makes me a better farmer. He's a good motivator to take longer walks in the fields. It is too tempting when I am busy to just drive by. You can't really know a field looking through a windshield. So out we go. While he is sniffing around I can check for bugs, soil moisture, weeds and the basic conditions of the crop. Plus, a little exercise doesn't hurt.

I hope y'all have a great week.
HAPPY FATHERS' DAY to all the Dad's.
As the old saying goes, becoming a father is easy, the world of being a Dad takes a real man.

P

First Irrigation

Hi there. Sorry about the late post. Busy weekend. Saturday graded papers and cooked for a charity event at a local art museum. Sunday Church and a birthday party for little Persia who is 3 today. I needed to go to work today to get some rest.

OK, back on the farm-

The big question is when to start irrigating the cotton.

If you start too early it can cause the plant to go to all stalk and no bolls. Not good since we get paid for producing bolls.

If you start too late, or the weather heats up real fast- you BBQ the plants. That's not good either. There is a point called the Permanent Wilting Point and it is as bad as it sounds; if they wilt too much it is permanent and that is not good. Little toasted cotton plants don't produce cotton either.

We are big fans of research from the University of California and the California State University system.They do basic research on question s like this. The UC Farm Advisors have actually developed ways to measure the plant and the soil to tell us when it is the perfect time to irrigate. Of course, as with most things, it looks great in the textbook, but how do you translate that into field conditions? So, each June we spend a lot of time checking fields and checking with each other. We calculate how long it will take to get over the fields and look at the weather forecast. Sooner or later it is time to pull the trigger and begin irrigate.

As you can see in the photo above we began the first field last week,after things started to warm up. We will hold off a few days and begin the second field the middle of the week as things warm up some more. Of course, that is after checking the soil moisture and the plants one more time.

I hope y'all have a great week.

P

So, how do farmers respond to goofy weather?

A short post this week, we have been busy visiting with family who came for Heidi and Will's wedding!

Thirty years ago this week I climbed up my first tractor here on the farm. Never expected to be here that long. It has been interesting to say the least.

I spent that first summer mostly driving a D-8 and working ground. The first three weeks it was 100 degrees plus. This boy, who grew up in San Diego was wondering what in the wide world of sports I was doing here.

While that first summer had three weeks of 100 plus weather, this June is beginning with cooler than average weather. Yesterday was perfect for the wedding. Today was ten degrees cooler and rainy. The newsies have called to do interviews asking how this goofy weather affects the crops. Well, the cooler weather slows crop development on all crops. Some like it better than others. My grape growing friends are saying their vines think  this is Napa weather. Of course, as soon as this rain passes by they will all be applying to sulfur to control mildew. The cherry guys have to be hating this rain. A little rain on the cherries and they will start splitting.

People ask what we do, as farmers, about the weather. We adjust. Normally we start watering the cotton the first week of June. But, since it is cool and raining we will wait. We have the fields ready to irrigate, the beds are ready, the ditches are put up and the pipe laid. If it warms up the end of the week we will start watering. Hopefully, we know our crops, our fields and the weather enough to make intelligent decisions. That's part of what makes this job so interesting. You can't just farm by the calendar.

I hope y'all have a great week.

Why We Irrigate and a Memorial Day Thank You

Which wheat field would you rather have?
You can't hurt my feelings, neither field is mine. But, both fields are within a mile of each other near our farm.

Or, this one?

   I hope you can see the difference. All the top field received in the way of water was this past winter's rainfall. The bottom field belongs to a neighbor who raises consistently excellent wheat.

   Can you see the difference? The top field is much sparser than the bottom field. If you could see the individual kernels, they are no more than 2/3s the size of the kernels in the bottom field. And that, dear readers is why farmers in my neighborhood irrigate. Even with 160% normal rainfall there isn't enough rain to raise even a decent wheat crop. Last year's dry land wheat fields in our area, again that was a wet winter, yielded only one half to three quarter of a ton per acre. Farmers who irrigated their wheat had yields of three to four tons of wheat per acre. Why wouldn't we irrigate. We can take a hundred to two hundred dollars of water and turn it into seven hundred to twelve hundred dollars worth of wheat.

Memorial Day

This weekend is Memorial Day. In spite of what many people think it is not merely the opening of the summer BBQ season and an important annual motorcar race. The celebration of Memorial Day goes back to just after the end of the Civil War. With Jonathan's deployments we have learned a new appreciation of the price of our freedoms. It is not only time to honor our fallen soldiers, but a good time to thank our veterans, our soldiers and their families. Waiting for your soldier, sailor, Marine or airman to come home can be very hard. My hat is especially off to the spouses who wait at home during long deployments. THANK YOU ALL!

I saw an important reminder a few years ago-

It is the Soldier

It is the soldier, not the reporter,

Who has given us freedom of the press.

It is the soldier, not the poet,

Who has given us freedom of speech.

It is the soldier,not the campus organizer,

Who has given s the freedom to demonstrate.

It is the soldier, not the lawyer,

who has given us the right to a fair trial.

It is the soldier, who salutes the flag,

Who serves beneath the flag,

And whose coffin is draped by the flag,

Who allows the protester to burn the flag.

Father Dennis Edward O'Brien

USMC

Again, Thank you all. I have not always been the most patriotic person, over the last ten years I have learned a new appreciation of the special country we live in and the price that has been paid for us to live here.



Fresh fruit season!

This has been a weed killing week. Once the weather dried off and warmed we got back in the field.
The corn may look short in this photo, but by the time we water it one more time and it dries out the corn will be too big to get the tractor in the field again. So this is our last chance to cultivate the weeds and form the furrows.

Now, people often ask why farmers use herbicides. Trust me, it is not because we want to. I am cheap and lazy. I would avoid the work if I could. But, when you have weeds you have to do something.

When you have weeds like this a hoe won't do. That is field bind weed, or perennial morning glory. It is a nasty little bugger with roots that can go down to eight feet. If you whack of the top it will just grow back. With Roundup we can kill the root.

Now we are careful, we don't just spray willy-nilly. In the picture below you can see our  hooded sprayer. We only spray over the pant where the cultivator can't cut the weeds out mechanically. By spraying a band on over the pant we can spray ounces where we used to have to spray gallons.

I don't know why the enviros get so crabby about genetic engineering. They fight us for decades to use less chemicals in our fields. We find a way to do it and they complain about that too. I guess some folks will never be satisfied.



 Well, there is more than work on the farm. I had dinner with some friends last night. Evelyn has been to Spain recently. She made paella and I brought fresh made Sangria. That was yummy. But, we have another treat for you this week.

Recipe of the Week-
Some of you think it is Spring and that is true. But, it is more than merely Spring, it is fresh fruit season. In our area fruit stands are springing up all over. I bought strawberries and the first peaches of the season. Yummmmmy.

Not that fresh fruit is boring in any way, but there is more than one way to eat fruit. I grilled some apples on the BBQ this week. That was fab-ulous. I got the recipe from a chef we met in Monterrey last week at the Rotary convention. This week's discovery was at least as tasty- fresh fruit margaritas!

I can't take the credit for it. I got the recipe from a friend, Moises.

Moises' Fresh Fruit Margaritas-

fill your blender with the fruit of your choice
[ I have used strawberries and peaches, works either way]

pour in a cup of tequila
[actually Moises uses vodka]

pour in some citrus to but the edge of the alcohol in the tequila
[Moises uses orange juice, I used triple sec]

put in half a dozen ice cubes and blend.

Pour and enjoy. Great on a warm afternoon.

I would think that should count as at least one serving of fresh fruit don't you?

May Wind and Rain?

Not only are we busy on the farm with the Spring Rush, but the weather gets crazy as we shift from winter to summer. The wind is crazy. We lost 18 trees in the wind last weekend and they are predicting more wind this weekend.
   It is hard to organize work in this weather. One year we had to wait three weeks to spray for weeds in the cotton. It was just too windy. When we finally got going Ruben finished the field in two and a half days- it just took three weeks of waiting.
   This was the day before hooded sprayers. Now we have hoods to cover the spray nozzles. We can spray in moderate winds and keep the material from drifting where it shouldn't go. Adapt, Innovate and Overcome. I am not much of a engineering, mechanical kind of guy, but I have to admit that the innovation of agricultural equipment over the past century is pretty amazing. We have taken a lot of the drudgery out of farm work and we have made both our people and our crops amazingly productive.

Some of my newer readers haven't met Indy, my co-pilot.

Indy is a little over a year and a half old. His Mom is a Golden Retriever. His Dad was a sneaky, neighbor dog. It is a common breed. For the past few months Indy has not wanted to come out for pick up rides. He's kind of big. He weighs 105 pounds. So I thought maybe he just wasn't comfortable in the pickup any more. I missed him, but you sure can't force 105 pounds of puppy into a pickup. One morning, last week he acted like he wanted to get in when I left in the morning. I stepped back from the door and he hopped right in. He's been out with me every day. I enjoy his company.
I have be re-inspired. At the Rotary conference this weekend there was a cooking class with a local chef from the Monterey area. Mmmm yummy. With Spring and summer come fresh fruits and vegetables. Time to start paying with my food again. He had some great ideas for grilling vegetables. I will share them with you after I have done some experimenting. His tow best words of encouragement was 'don't be intimidated to try something new' and 'sometimes less is more.' We have such an amazing selection of fresh fruits and vegetables. Let the natural tastes of the food come out, don't cover it up. I am inspired.

I hope y'all have a great week.

P