We have survived the holiday! For the most part the farm cooperated enough that we could enjoy our company and attend two family events in two days. There were basic complications, the first of which was Bruce announcing late last week that the diagnosis as to what was wrong with our harvestore unloader was it was constipated! When I asked him what that meant he said "there is lots of grunting, groaning and squeeling and nothing coming out". We believe that the upper chain is stuck in what is probably 2009 corn. That year the corn was very wet with a lot of fines in it, and with all the weight of a full silo on it the unloader just can't handle it. The harvestore people came and tried to put an auger in but the one they brought wasn't long enough. In the process of putting it in and pulling it out they did get enough corn lose that Bruce could feed, and they came back the next day with a bigger auger that is now working. This auger is geared slow so that the corn could go directly into the roller mill. For our system that means it used to take 3 minutes to get the normal amount of corn out and now it will take 20 minutes. The process of getting corn will have to stay this way until we get enough fed out that the chain will be able to move again. The only other complication of the holidays was having 2 special needs heifers to milk. Both had mastitis and one is mean to the point that her days may be numbered here if she doesn't improve her attitude. Other than that, we were able to shorten our work days to 4 hours for me and 6-7 hours for Bruce. The weather, cattle and equipment cooperated and it was all good but we are definitely tired!
Other events to note is we have received our property tax bill. As the proud owner of 269 acres we get to pay $7,371, divided between the state, technical college, township, county, school district. (listed lowest to highest percentage). We get to pay this in 2 payments, the first one due by 1/31 and the second one due 7/31. Something to look forward to : (
We received the check for the steers we sold. We received the highest price we have ever gotten, and this is nice on the receiving end. On the other side of the check we worry about people who won't be able to afford to buy food.
The neighboring machinist picked up the shaft for the manure spreader, fixed it and returned it the next day with a bill for $45. Since the rest of the parts are standard bearings, etc the repair will be rather inexpensive, especially compared to some of our other repair adventures this year. Bruce is hoping to get it put back together soon.
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