Organic Wheat

      Finally.

     The call came about 9 a.m. Wednesday morning.  I wasn’t ready for it.  I was working on what has become a chronic frustration.  I was trying to get the 820 starter motor to start so I can try starting the 820.

    It was Leonard on the phone.  I had conversed with Leonard four or five times since last September. 

     “If I send you a couple of trucks, can you load them today?”

      “Today?  No way,” I said.  Leonard went on to explain that his truckers had hauled two loads of soybeans to Missouri and were on the return trip.  It would serve them well to swing by and pick up some wheat from me.

     I had about given up on Leonard.  We came close to making a deal last October, but it fell through.  The problem was scheduling a time when I could be at the farm to set up the equipment to unload the bin and when he had train cars.

      I had called him various times from April on.  About a week ago, I decided to try one more time.  If we failed to make the deal, I would once more haul wheat to town.

      The millet is looking very good.  We will need the bin space for that crop.

     Coming from Missouri?  That gave me some time.  “Well, I might be able to do it,” I relented.

     “I’ll give you the trucker’s number.  You can talk to him.”

      So I called the Dave, the trucker.  They were in Salina, Kansas.  They would be there awhile because they were buying truck tires.

       I asked where he would turn off I-70 to go north, back to Nebraska—Wyoming.  “Goodland,” Dave said.

      “Call me when you get to Colby and I’ll let you know if I’m ready.”  There we left it and I went to work with a sense of urgency.

     The first thing I had to do was mow around the grain bin and mow a path for the trucks to follow to the grain bin.  I didn’t spend much time at that.  Too many other things to get ready.          

    There are quite a few links in the chain of setting up the bin unloading equipment.  The weakest link is the old Lawson engine used to drive the horizontal under-floor auger.  I started there.

      The Lawson has been in the barn since the last bin un-loading last June.  I took off the gas line, the bowl filter and cleaned that all out, blew out and rinsed out the gas tank, and reassembled.  Next, I tried to deal with all the leaks that spring up when the fuel delivery system is disturbed.

       All was well.  The old thing fired on the second rope pull.  An oil change and it was ready.  Next on the list of links was the “slide” that opens to allow the wheat to run through the floor into the auger.  I greased it up before we filled the bin last July, hoping it wouldn’t get rusted and might be easier to get open.

        It was some easier, but not a whole lot.  I had to put a hydraulic jack against the bin wall and use it to push on the rod attached to the slide.  The “rod” is  ½” pipe.  With pressure on the pipe, a couple of taps with a hammer got the slide moving, and soon it was open and letting wheat down into the auger channel.

    That was the end of my morning.  After a short lunch break, I drug the fifteen feet of auger out of the combine shed and placed it precariously on the back of the golf cart.  It went into place in the channel beneath the granary floor with a minimum of trouble.  The Lawson engine was soon attached and that was ready to go.

      The Mayrath auger was next.  Repeat the gas delivery system clean up.  The Briggs and Stratton had a quart of gas still in the tank.  That drained out, bowl and line purged, and it was ready.  It started on the first pull.  It too got an oil change.  The long drive belts went on.

      I rolled the Mayrath into place, its intake end under the spout of the horizontal auger.  One more thing to do—purge the augers.

     It was about 4 p.m.  Dave called.  They were in Goodland.  Was I ready?  “I will be by the time you get here.  Goodland is a hundred miles.”

      Luck was with me.  I needed a truck to dump some wheat into.  The old GMC fired right up and was soon beneath the Mayrath auger.  Both engines fired up.  When I slid the Briggs back to tighten the Mayrath drive belts, a huge bird nest came out of the spout.  That’s pretty usual.

      Soon both augers were running and after a little trash, both augers were spouting clean wheat.  Yeah!!  I was ready.  It was a little after five.

     The trucks rolled in about 5:45.  We were augering wheat slightly before 6 p.m.  The trucks rolled out in the dusk after 8 p.m.  One truck was only half loaded because one of its two bins was loaded with truck tires, a result of the stop in Salina.  They hauled 1300 bushels.

     Plans called for them to return Thursday afternoon and finish the job.  Dave called a little after four and said they were on their way from Bushnel, Nebraska.  I stopped mowing and headed for the house about 5 p.m.

     It was raining.  About 6 p.m., Dave called again.  They were staying in Brush.  It was raining there, too.  They would be there in the morning.

     Early morning, I asked.  I have to be in Loveland in the early afternoon, to Fort Collins by four, to Eaton by five for a quartet appearance.  “Before eight,” Dave assured me.

      Friday morning was foggy, wet, and chilly, 51 degrees.  Thursday’s rain had only been a tenth of an inch, so mud wasn’t a problem. 

       We had to shovel the last hundred or so bushels.  Dave jumped in the bin with me, so it was no problem.  The paperwork was done and the trucks were rolling out of the yard before 10:30.

      Leonard was happy with the quality of wheat (9-10% protein, 60 pound test weight, nice red color) and echoed the truck drivers’ comment on how clean it is compared to what they usually get.

    So my first shipment of organic wheat, recognized as organic wheat, is in Bushnel, Nebraska, sitting in a rail car waiting to go who-knows-where.  Dave thought maybe Canada.

     Stay tuned.  I’ll let you know where.  And, if all the extra work for organic certification is worth it.

    The drivers--father and son.

Tarped & ready to go.