Just Have Fun with It.

As I imagined, you are waiting with bated breath for the much anticipated second installment of farming implements. The one caveat I bring to this post is I am not an expert. This is written by the layman, for the layman, in layman's terms. So for those of you non-layman reading this (assuming there IS someone reading this) who know more than me, please don't shame me publicly. I did my best. And since there's no good way to get started I'll jump right in.

This handy little implement is pulled behind the tractor to inject fertilizer into the ground and is called a strip-till machine.

Strip-Till Machine (AKA: puts down fertilizer) Because I haven't figured out how to add fancy arrows on the picture to demonstrate what I'm saying, please be patient with me as I try to explain. Do you see the spikey circles in the back? Well in front of those are round discs, and in front of those round discs are little sprayers that put the fertilizer into the ground between 7 and 9 inches. Then the spikey thing packs the dirt back down so the ground is ready for the seed. In the process / timeline of farming, fertilizer is applied first. Now that’s not to say it’s only applied one time in a crop's life cycle, but the ground should be treated first to provide nutrients for the planted seed. So, if Farmer Tim decides it needs another round of nutrients, it can be done AFTER the seed has been planted. This silver bullet is our wheat drill, which moonlights as a total babe magnet. Wheat Drill (AKA: Crustbuster, planter of wheat) The drill plants the seed wheat (yes, it sounds backwards), which is typically done in the month of September or October. This is a picture of Tim, with the help of his brother, filling the drill with seed from the red truck. Assuming the tractor and drill are behaving, Tim will stop every two or three hours to reload seed. What you probably can't see are the deep compartments for the seed and HOW MUCH can fit inside. Tim and I must have been really bored are really cool because one time we did some math to figure out that he planted approximately 1,350,000,000 seeds across the entirety of the farm!!! You read that right- BILLion. It's ok to be amazed. It's now midnight and this post took entirely way too long to write. There are a few more implement tricks up my sleeve but that will have to be for another day. Wish Tim luck because in 6 hours he will have to try and wake me up so we can go to the final day of our K-State (go CATS!!) farm management, MAST class. Yay for learning. And remember to just have fun with it.