Got in the field yesterday

Its been a wet cold spring this year that's for sure, The ground got dry enough to get a crossed to work it for the first time. It's still early to plant beans and I'm in no hurry to plant. This ground is funky to say the least, In the fall you have to disc the ground lightly (just enough to cover the soybean stubble) or come spring with the trash covering the ground it will not dry out at all. So yesterday I hooked my Oliver 1550 up to the 10ft 3pt field cuilt and hooked the section harrow to it and headed to the field. Some of it broke up good and some broke into chunks that will brake up when it get a rain on it tonight or this weekend. The funny thing about this ground is it very rarely brakes up like normal ground, It more or less shatters into little flakes type klinkers (for the lack of better terms) and makes wonderfull marble and golf ball sized clods till it gets a rain on it and it mellows out. Anyway the Oliver 1550 diesel just purred along pulling it however she did some barking in a couple spots in the field ware it was real hard. I hit it twice and got rid of the green and I hope that one pass with the disc and hit it with the harrow-gater and it will be ready to plant. At least that's the plan, Hope it works. Only one bad thing happened, Lost a shovel off a shank and I don't want to find it with a tire. Bandit

Don't know where you are, Bandit, but "it's been a cold wet spring" applies to me in SC also. We check on the temps in E IA and St Louis because of family connections, and 5-10 degrees warmer there than here in the sunny South. The mostly good part is that it has been wet so far. I've had drouth and would rather deal with the wet.

KEH

I have some ground similar to that. It has yellow clay in it and just won't break up smaller than peas. We always called it rat turd clay.

Well I'm 35 miles East of Cincinnati Ohio in Blanchester Oh, Untill this week nobody was doing anything in the fields but their running full bore now planting. No beans in the ground yet just corn, The local BTO said they have planted 5300 acres so far this week and they hope to be done with corn by the middle to late next week if the weather holds for them. I could plant this ground I have worked up but the ground is still kind of cold and this is the first good warm stretch of weather we have had this year, So it's par for the course so far. I am still on the list to have most of my ground sprayed for burn down so I can no-till, It hard to be small farmer in an area full of BTO's so I have to wait. It's fun to be the little guy growing good crops but it can be a pain in the butt. Bandit

Some of this ground if you get on it wet will turn tires blue when the mud dries and come off, Its some fun stuff to work with that's for sure. This picture kind of shows it but not the best. It grows some really good crops but boy is it funky to work with. The old man that owned the ground behind us said "If you can learn to farm this ground you can farm any ware in the world" And I believe him now. Bandit

Father-in-law had some soil like that. He puled a cultipacker behind cultivator or disk to break up clods. I always thought he was probably compacting the soil even more. Myself, the sand here rarely clods up. Except where the local septage hauler injects his stuff. That completely changes the texture of the soil for a couple seasons. I've got my oats planted, and up 2 to 3 inches. All the planting I'm going to do this year. Watch out when haying season comes on however!

We are having a much nicer spring than last year - warmer, less rain - closer to "normal". I planted oats on the 1st and 2nd, it rained on the 3rd, but I was able to finish up my oats on the 5th. Just over 50 acres of corn to go and I'll be done... but we've gotten several inches of rain since Tuesday night. Will need 4-5 nice days before I can think about going again.