The Farm is now called Hurricane Hills. I think Nola would have liked that. Bull for all intents and purposes, I suspect that everyone will still just call it the Wieland farm. Probate is done. Ed and I now carry the full responsibility for this piece of land and all that is on it. I avoid using the word 'own' because really, it is just conservator-ship. We have done very well, all considered. In spite of the rather abrupt transfer of responsibility, and the sad circumstances, we have indeed shown a successful start. JB and family have done a wonderful job stepping into the active role of caring for the farm on a daily basis. LP and family have been enormously helpful. JN and family have been wonderful. GS and family have been great neighbors. The whole community has been welcoming. I suspect that there are a few getting chuckles out of my stumbling around with the business end of things. But neighborly patients has been shown to us by everyone from the folks at FSA to the insurance agents.
JB got our crops in good time in spite of rather poor weather this spring. Our yields on beans have been much better than we expected. Unfortunately, the commodities market is a sinking ship along with the rest of the US economy. Such mis-handling! I hope I am never seen to be to this farm what I see these idiots in the congress and administration are to this country, simply negligent.
But the land is doing well, the house is lived in and remodeled and looks great. The new furnaces should be in by now, beans are out of the field and corn should be coming out soon. In spite of the challenges, the Farm is doing well. I don't think Nola would be disappointed at all.
October 7, 2008
November 27, 2007
Minor change...
Have decided this blog is better suited to just the farm. My brain dumps regarding less farm-like issues will be here from now on... http://wjwieland.blogspot.com/
November 8, 2007
...Answers...
There is no such thing as an answer. Entropy ensures this. Assuming that entropy is a continuous flow process which is itself characteristically dynamic in response to the changes it incites, and that an answer is a singleton solution to a set of static conditions, the possibility of an answer impossible.
Mankind has spent a great deal of time searching for answers. Science looks for answers. Religion seeks to provide answers. Philosophy professes to examine questions so that we can understand the answers. A whole economy has been built around selling us answers that are based on question which led to solutions which have been examined by experts. But what if there are not any? What if that opening sentence is a truth?
It would be easy to classify this line of thought as destructive, pacifistic, defeatist, or even nihilistic. But maybe it is not. We are trained to seek results, little points in time when we can say that a particular statement is true, that it is a statement of fact. We seem to search for and hang on to statics, and value them when we think we have found them. Sometimes to the point of blindness.
I think that if we are to survive our future, we are going to have to adjust ourselves to a new way of thinking. We need to continually search for the properly scoped question. And a properly scoped question has no answer, only subsets of questions which drive us to discover.
Maybe the question to the answer is 'Ain't it cool to just accept that life is a strange place?' And just think, I don't need a team of experts with a team of marketing people supporting them to sell that to me. It is free, open source. I think I will stick with that... . I just ain't buying anymore... :-)
Mankind has spent a great deal of time searching for answers. Science looks for answers. Religion seeks to provide answers. Philosophy professes to examine questions so that we can understand the answers. A whole economy has been built around selling us answers that are based on question which led to solutions which have been examined by experts. But what if there are not any? What if that opening sentence is a truth?
It would be easy to classify this line of thought as destructive, pacifistic, defeatist, or even nihilistic. But maybe it is not. We are trained to seek results, little points in time when we can say that a particular statement is true, that it is a statement of fact. We seem to search for and hang on to statics, and value them when we think we have found them. Sometimes to the point of blindness.
I think that if we are to survive our future, we are going to have to adjust ourselves to a new way of thinking. We need to continually search for the properly scoped question. And a properly scoped question has no answer, only subsets of questions which drive us to discover.
Maybe the question to the answer is 'Ain't it cool to just accept that life is a strange place?' And just think, I don't need a team of experts with a team of marketing people supporting them to sell that to me. It is free, open source. I think I will stick with that... . I just ain't buying anymore... :-)
November 2, 2007
Geometry (not) remembered...
Just some notes about the bins for my own reference:
Bin in the valley ~= 9940 bu
94' circumference
15' radius
17.5' height(actual is 18.5, subtract for ventilated floor)
Main Bin on farm ~= 11364 bu
94' circumference
15' radius
20' height (actual is 21', but have to subtract for ventilated floor)
Overflow bin farm ~= 3273 bu
56.5' circumference
9' radius
16' height
(cone to within 1' of roof ~=543 bu
radius of a circle = (c/pi)/2
volume of a cylinder = (pi*r^2)*h
1 cubic foot = 0.803569313 bushel ... or
1 bushel = 1.244456083 cubic feet.
...
Bin in the valley ~= 9940 bu
94' circumference
15' radius
17.5' height(actual is 18.5, subtract for ventilated floor)
Main Bin on farm ~= 11364 bu
94' circumference
15' radius
20' height (actual is 21', but have to subtract for ventilated floor)
Overflow bin farm ~= 3273 bu
56.5' circumference
9' radius
16' height
(cone to within 1' of roof ~=543 bu
radius of a circle = (c/pi)/2
volume of a cylinder = (pi*r^2)*h
1 cubic foot = 0.803569313 bushel ... or
1 bushel = 1.244456083 cubic feet.
...
November 1, 2007
Beans...
The soybeans are out of the fields. What a relief! The yield was not good, moisture was higher than we wanted resulting in a fair amount of pod being left in with the harvest, we lost some due to the plants having laid down, and some we just plain had to leave because the fields were too wet. All that having been said, we easily made what I had contracted for river open in march. Even if I get docked for quality, I will have enough to make up for it in volume over and above the contract.
Lesson learned: Don't contract more than 40% of what you have in the field for future delivery. We got lucky. I hedged my bets and counted on 20% per acre less than what we hoped for (average yield), then used that 40% of that number to gauge what I should contract ahead of time. I did that because I wanted to be safe, but all along I was figuring on having 60% to contract off after harvest.
My real numbers actually split the other way, with 60% of my crop already contracted and 40% still in the bin uncontracted. Considering the quality of what we harvested, we can probably count on 10% - 15% loss at the terminal. Time to call the crop insurance guy. Based on projected yields, we lost almost 50% of the expected revenue from soybeans. Sad, but not catastrophic. I am gratefull Nola insured for 80% of expected revenue.
Overall, The Farm has done alright in spite of the absense of Nola. As I have mentioned before, our neighbors (now fast becoming friends) have pulled us through with a lot of good advice and a lot of hard work. The crops are out of the fields, the fields are prepped for next spring. The seed and fertilizer have been ordered for next spring as well. We have enough fuel to run the house furnace enough to keep the pipes from freezing. The estate auction has been planned.
The last two months of the year will be spent paying a lot of bills from harvest, getting ready for tax season...., and wondering what we are going to look like come next year. With the operation shrinking back to the original 240 acres, we are going to have a very different picture. Our tillable land will have been reduced by about 68 acres, or about 32%. That of course reduces what we can produce. However, it also reduces our input costs substatially. That is 100 acres that we don't have to pay taxes on, 68 acres that we don't have to til, fertilize, spray, insure, or worry about flooding. I suspect that when we look at the number spread over a couple of years, we will find that the overall profitability of The Farm will go up by reducing in size. Time will tell.
There is a lot left to learn, many decisions to be made. The land will guide us and teach us as long as we listen.
Lesson learned: Don't contract more than 40% of what you have in the field for future delivery. We got lucky. I hedged my bets and counted on 20% per acre less than what we hoped for (average yield), then used that 40% of that number to gauge what I should contract ahead of time. I did that because I wanted to be safe, but all along I was figuring on having 60% to contract off after harvest.
My real numbers actually split the other way, with 60% of my crop already contracted and 40% still in the bin uncontracted. Considering the quality of what we harvested, we can probably count on 10% - 15% loss at the terminal. Time to call the crop insurance guy. Based on projected yields, we lost almost 50% of the expected revenue from soybeans. Sad, but not catastrophic. I am gratefull Nola insured for 80% of expected revenue.
Overall, The Farm has done alright in spite of the absense of Nola. As I have mentioned before, our neighbors (now fast becoming friends) have pulled us through with a lot of good advice and a lot of hard work. The crops are out of the fields, the fields are prepped for next spring. The seed and fertilizer have been ordered for next spring as well. We have enough fuel to run the house furnace enough to keep the pipes from freezing. The estate auction has been planned.
The last two months of the year will be spent paying a lot of bills from harvest, getting ready for tax season...., and wondering what we are going to look like come next year. With the operation shrinking back to the original 240 acres, we are going to have a very different picture. Our tillable land will have been reduced by about 68 acres, or about 32%. That of course reduces what we can produce. However, it also reduces our input costs substatially. That is 100 acres that we don't have to pay taxes on, 68 acres that we don't have to til, fertilize, spray, insure, or worry about flooding. I suspect that when we look at the number spread over a couple of years, we will find that the overall profitability of The Farm will go up by reducing in size. Time will tell.
There is a lot left to learn, many decisions to be made. The land will guide us and teach us as long as we listen.
October 25, 2007
Reflection...
Late June: The caretaker of The Farm has died. Nola is suddenly and unexpectedly gone. There is way too much to say about her tenure here, and excepting one subject, this is not the place to do it. That exception is The Farm. Nola was born on The Farm. She never lived anywhere else in her 60+ years. She was taught to work the farm, and I mean do all the work; feed the animals, muck out pens, milk the cows (back before there were milking machines, mind you), slop the hogs, till the soil, plant crops, bail hay, maintain equipment, harvest crops, know when to call the vet, and the list goes on and on. The volume of knowledge required to successfully run a family farm is, well, voluminous. Her teachers were her parents, Otto and Meta Wieland, and her uncles and neighbors. And, I believe, her most important instructor was the land itself.
Looking at The Farm, it is easy at this juncture in time to say "That is Nola". That is both accurate (metaphorically) and incomplete. It is much more. It is the sweat and blood (literally sometimes), the pride and joy of the efforts of many stretching over generations. Each of those people learned from the land. The land is the most harsh and loving of instructors. Each of the individuals that took responsibility for the care of this land has had to become the land, and let the land become them. Those folks have to have the temerity to endure what the land endures, the intelligence and scope of understanding to be able to take what they feel of the land, what they see, and make decisions that are balanced. Decisions that are hard in the short term sometimes, harsh. They have to take risks and recognize the risk that they are taking. All these things we all do every day of our lives, in our jobs, our families. But for me, The Farm is where these are things that I live, not just things that I do. I am just scratching the surface of all that, it has only been a quarter of a year.
I have joked with my friends at AmFam that I am going to start a country called "Wie Land'. It will be located in a place near a town called Lancaster in Grant County, Wisconsin. And my brother Ed and I will reign over that country. There will be no law except that of Rational Anarchy. The land itself will rule. But in a way that is already the way it is. Perhaps I will expand on that some day.
Now, the responsibility has fallen to my brother and me. We have to, and are, learning a lot very fast. I can't know whether we are learning enough fast enough. Time will tell(I hate truisms that are cleche!, detracts somehow from the meaning).
At any rate, our first order of business was to get probate going. That is scary. We have not had to face that before. We are fortunate that there are very few complications. The PR is wonderful. The Lawyer, calm and competent.
Day to day operations fell to me. Our neighbors have been indispensable, supportive, and genuinely concerned. First order of business. Assess what we have in the fields, what resources we have to work with, and get a flexible, scalable plan in place to finish out the year. Again, our neighbors are invaluable. John B., Gary S., the Nimitz family, and many others contribute. The winter wheat comes out in July, and we sell it out of the field. Thirty one acres that yield very well. We don't get much straw though, and John B. is disappointed, he could have used a lot more I think. The early drought we had stunted the plant growth. Just after Nola died, we started to get rain. The corn had been starting to curl, and then we got rain. And crops thrived.
July also sees that last of the corn from previous years come out of the bins. Close to 8000 bushel. The money is needed. There are a lot of bills to pay. We now have a break to get ready for this years corn. The bins get cleaned, we mow the grass breaks around the corn fields. Equipment is made ready. And all the while, we are assessing, finding out how to contract the harvest, contracting fuel, trying to budget for next year, and taking care of probate issues...., they never seem to end.
In the mean time, I was liking my job at AmFam. The work was challenging, the people are simply fantastic. My teammates have become friends. We laugh, argue, joke, analyze, trying to fit this odd ILP thing into the standard process. It truly is like trying to plug a 3 prong plug into a two prong socket. Either you have to cut off a lug, or re-wire the house. But it can work. The domains need to be re-defined.
The strain on my family is telling though. I have the utmost confidence in Oxana and Yulia, but this situation is a strain. They have incredible strength! And Oxana's pragmatic point of view challenges me to not over-focus. The Farm can consume people too, even more so than a job. The Farm is more than a job, it is a life of its own, and it will devour you if you let it. Oxana prevents this. Without her, I would not be able to keep my balance.
It got to be corn time. I took a week off of work, except for one day when we could not get into the fields, too wet. But we got it all out, 90 some acres, yielding an average of 210 bushel per acer. Better than 18,000 bushel of corn. Both bins are full, and I do mean full! No major breakdowns, no injuries (except missing skin here and there). I learned a bit about running the combine, a lot about running the drier.
Now all that is left is the beans. We are of course worried. They should be out of the field by the 31st of October and it is still too wet to get into the fields. The rain that saved the wheat and corn just does not seem to want to stop. We have had well over a foot of rain since July. All we can do is wait and hope for 5-7 days of dry weather.
I can imagine my teammates at AmFam are perhaps somewhat relieved that they don't have to hear about commodities pricing, or field conditions, or equipment concerns. I am so grateful to them, they listened when I needed to talk. I already miss them more than they can know. But I am back with my family again after 13 months of weekends only, and sometimes not even weekends. We have survived and in fact are thriving, a very good thing!
And there is this thing of having something behind us that we know we can always go back (or forward) to. The Farm.
Looking at The Farm, it is easy at this juncture in time to say "That is Nola". That is both accurate (metaphorically) and incomplete. It is much more. It is the sweat and blood (literally sometimes), the pride and joy of the efforts of many stretching over generations. Each of those people learned from the land. The land is the most harsh and loving of instructors. Each of the individuals that took responsibility for the care of this land has had to become the land, and let the land become them. Those folks have to have the temerity to endure what the land endures, the intelligence and scope of understanding to be able to take what they feel of the land, what they see, and make decisions that are balanced. Decisions that are hard in the short term sometimes, harsh. They have to take risks and recognize the risk that they are taking. All these things we all do every day of our lives, in our jobs, our families. But for me, The Farm is where these are things that I live, not just things that I do. I am just scratching the surface of all that, it has only been a quarter of a year.
I have joked with my friends at AmFam that I am going to start a country called "Wie Land'. It will be located in a place near a town called Lancaster in Grant County, Wisconsin. And my brother Ed and I will reign over that country. There will be no law except that of Rational Anarchy. The land itself will rule. But in a way that is already the way it is. Perhaps I will expand on that some day.
Now, the responsibility has fallen to my brother and me. We have to, and are, learning a lot very fast. I can't know whether we are learning enough fast enough. Time will tell(I hate truisms that are cleche!, detracts somehow from the meaning).
At any rate, our first order of business was to get probate going. That is scary. We have not had to face that before. We are fortunate that there are very few complications. The PR is wonderful. The Lawyer, calm and competent.
Day to day operations fell to me. Our neighbors have been indispensable, supportive, and genuinely concerned. First order of business. Assess what we have in the fields, what resources we have to work with, and get a flexible, scalable plan in place to finish out the year. Again, our neighbors are invaluable. John B., Gary S., the Nimitz family, and many others contribute. The winter wheat comes out in July, and we sell it out of the field. Thirty one acres that yield very well. We don't get much straw though, and John B. is disappointed, he could have used a lot more I think. The early drought we had stunted the plant growth. Just after Nola died, we started to get rain. The corn had been starting to curl, and then we got rain. And crops thrived.
July also sees that last of the corn from previous years come out of the bins. Close to 8000 bushel. The money is needed. There are a lot of bills to pay. We now have a break to get ready for this years corn. The bins get cleaned, we mow the grass breaks around the corn fields. Equipment is made ready. And all the while, we are assessing, finding out how to contract the harvest, contracting fuel, trying to budget for next year, and taking care of probate issues...., they never seem to end.
In the mean time, I was liking my job at AmFam. The work was challenging, the people are simply fantastic. My teammates have become friends. We laugh, argue, joke, analyze, trying to fit this odd ILP thing into the standard process. It truly is like trying to plug a 3 prong plug into a two prong socket. Either you have to cut off a lug, or re-wire the house. But it can work. The domains need to be re-defined.
The strain on my family is telling though. I have the utmost confidence in Oxana and Yulia, but this situation is a strain. They have incredible strength! And Oxana's pragmatic point of view challenges me to not over-focus. The Farm can consume people too, even more so than a job. The Farm is more than a job, it is a life of its own, and it will devour you if you let it. Oxana prevents this. Without her, I would not be able to keep my balance.
It got to be corn time. I took a week off of work, except for one day when we could not get into the fields, too wet. But we got it all out, 90 some acres, yielding an average of 210 bushel per acer. Better than 18,000 bushel of corn. Both bins are full, and I do mean full! No major breakdowns, no injuries (except missing skin here and there). I learned a bit about running the combine, a lot about running the drier.
Now all that is left is the beans. We are of course worried. They should be out of the field by the 31st of October and it is still too wet to get into the fields. The rain that saved the wheat and corn just does not seem to want to stop. We have had well over a foot of rain since July. All we can do is wait and hope for 5-7 days of dry weather.
I can imagine my teammates at AmFam are perhaps somewhat relieved that they don't have to hear about commodities pricing, or field conditions, or equipment concerns. I am so grateful to them, they listened when I needed to talk. I already miss them more than they can know. But I am back with my family again after 13 months of weekends only, and sometimes not even weekends. We have survived and in fact are thriving, a very good thing!
And there is this thing of having something behind us that we know we can always go back (or forward) to. The Farm.
October 15, 2007
Sometimes...
As an patriotic, nationalist, American anarchist, I have tended to lean towards the right in my politics. I prefer to remain, for the most part, somewhat distant from the political rhetoric and debate. If drawn into it, I would rather take an analytical approach, maintaining a more or less philosophical flavourf to any resulting debate. I really dislike emotionally charged conflict regarding politics.
But sometimes the only way I can find to express what I really think regarding politics is through a different channel. The last eight years have led me to a state of dis-enchantment. After eight years, I am left with only uncomfortable questions, the most serious of which is what do we stand for?
As I was making my journey from my home to my place of work this evening, I listened to a song which directly correlates to the "feeling" I have regarding these last eight years.
Most anyone that reads this will recognize the words and the artists, so I won't delve into the musical history. It just fits for me. Take it or leave it, it is my bloody blog.
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgment of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
The change, it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the foe, that' all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain't changed
'Cause the banners, they all flown in the last war
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
No, no!
I'll move myself and my family aside
If we happen to be left half alive
I'll get all my papers and smile at the sky
For I know that the hypnotized never lie
Do ya?
Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
There's nothing in the street
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Is now the parting on the right
And the beards have all grown longer overnight
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
Don't get fooled again
No, no!
Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
But sometimes the only way I can find to express what I really think regarding politics is through a different channel. The last eight years have led me to a state of dis-enchantment. After eight years, I am left with only uncomfortable questions, the most serious of which is what do we stand for?
As I was making my journey from my home to my place of work this evening, I listened to a song which directly correlates to the "feeling" I have regarding these last eight years.
Most anyone that reads this will recognize the words and the artists, so I won't delve into the musical history. It just fits for me. Take it or leave it, it is my bloody blog.
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgment of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
The change, it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the foe, that' all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain't changed
'Cause the banners, they all flown in the last war
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
No, no!
I'll move myself and my family aside
If we happen to be left half alive
I'll get all my papers and smile at the sky
For I know that the hypnotized never lie
Do ya?
Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
There's nothing in the street
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Is now the parting on the right
And the beards have all grown longer overnight
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
Don't get fooled again
No, no!
Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
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