Hello welcome to Kate's Ag today is another very exciting day on our Montana Farm during
winter wheat Harvest I am in the combine again
we have the pickup headers on the combine still so we're picking up the winter wheat
swaths this field was swathed back and forth because there are a lot of very bumpy sprayer
tracks and also furrows in the field so the swather wanted to go back and forth with it
rather than all the way around because when you swath the wheat in this direction you
have you go with the furrows and then across and then with so it's much easier for the
swather to go back and forth and we swath our wheat due to an insect called Saw Fly
that basically Burrows into the stem of the wheat and makes it fall over so if you're
able to swath it before it falls over you save a large percentage of your crop last
year we had a spring wheat crop that we didn't swath or get to with the big headers where
you straight cut soon enough and we lost 85 to 90 percent of our crops so that's a big
reason why we swath our wheat I just saw the most awesome Antelope running the through
the field I'm dumping every full round back and forth so I'll pick up a pass headed north
come back headed south and then dump in the truck we do have our grain cart working as
you would have seen from the past videos but our grain car driver Austin is actually in
the swather today so we don't have a grain cart at the moment and we don't really need
one because we just go up and down and dump in the truck so it's all going to be okay
I still have my handheld radio right here which is actually so hard to hear whenever
someone speaks on the radio and I think it's directed towards me I have to ask them to
say it again and put it up close to my ear and then here I just have my control panel
my hydrostat which controls speed so faster moves forward back keeps it at the same speed
in a combine you can move one tenth of a mile an hour faster or slower so that is pretty
cool and you wouldn't think a tenth of a mile an hour would make a difference at all but
it actually makes a really big difference so if I'm going 3.1 and change it to 3.2 I
notice the difference in speed I have an active header height control problem so I just give
a green check mark to that it says we're getting about 10 bushels per acre Montana and our
specific area has been massive drought so this is probably the worst crops that my family
has ever seen it's really quite sad the wheat says it's about at eight percent moisture
which is good we don't want to harvest wheat over 12 moisture because then we can't put
it in the grain bins if you put over 12 moisture wheat in the grain bins it will mold and it
can start to catch on fire so I just finished the end of my row I picked my header up turn
let's see I don't think this other truck is full so I'm gonna go over to it first so I
just turned the header in the back of my machine off which processes the wheat see if this
other truck is full or not we do have another truck out to the field now let's see it might
be full and it might be able to take a little bit more so I'll go ahead and press this button
here which puts my auger out now that my auger is out I am going to line up to the truck
so I was right this truck is not quite full yet it probably needs Arvid our other combine
driver to dump on the back of it as well we'll see here how much I fill it oh oh no no no
no no no I almost made it spill over because I wanted my arm
okay Darcy thinks that I'll fill him we'll see
I think Kate's got enough to fill me so just dump in the other truck
so I'm just moving my auger I accidentally overfilled that part which makes it hard for
the truck drivers to tarp their truck so I've completely filled Darcy and Darcy is an employee
who has been with us since before it was born which is really cool you're full Darcy ok
thank you now I'm headed back over to the field we still do not have our other combine
working actually my dad flew to Glasgow to pick up the part or a kit that allows us to
change the feeder belt of the header to one that doesn't do extra things because we don't
need that it's really quite complicated actually John Deere mechanics are so busy this time
of year it's really hard to be able to get them to come out to your field so they've
been working on it and hopefully we'll have it back in the field soon and since we've
only got the two combines it makes back and forth passes a lot easier and farmers who
only have two combines always swath back and forth because it's nicer on the swather to
go with the furrows but if you have three combines then it makes it super complicated
because you have to skip a row and in my opinion you lose out on efficiency so that's something
you definitely have to consider and then you also have to take a look at your field and
what is the almost lined up to the wrong row here you have to take a look at your field
and ask yourself what's best that year because farming has so many variables and there's
different circumstances that require you to use a different farming practice maybe than
what you normally use and that's kind of what happened in this field the other day I plugged
my header up twice and Arvid plugged his header up too and that's just because there is so
much loose dirt here and the wheat didn't grow very tall because of the drought it's
maybe this tall so all of it's laying on the ground and to pick it up you have to kind
of get in the small dirt so it's really not ideal in any situation now I've just started
my pass again I hold my right hand on the hydrostat at all times and my left hand on
the wheel the way combines drive is you have to steer them one way and then steer them
back the hydrostat also has buttons to control lifting and lowering your header this header
has the ability to tilt so occasionally I check my screen here to make sure that it
hasn't tilted on me accidentally because I would tilt it back I just want it running
straight and level and then it's got some other buttons for header height control it
also has your auger in and out button and then also a button to turn off and on the
grain for your auger so it really controls a lot of things which is why you have your
hand on it at all times and I would say it's more important to have your hand on the hydrostat
than even the steering wheel because if you have a rock or something that's right in front
of your combine and your header starts pushing it and you need to just lift the header over
the rock which I've had several times happen in this field you need to be right on top
of that otherwise it could damage the equipment also you may have a small bird or baby Pheasant
run out from the wheat swath and you need to be able to quickly react to that by pulling
back on the hydrostat now it's saying about 15 bushels per acre which is much better than
we were getting in our first field we harvested this year there are also lots of different
buttons but we haven't calibrated most of the technology in our combines or equipment
because it takes time and it's also extremely complicated the John Deere books are like
this big so we just make sure our combines are in the field running and if they're picking
up wheat well you think that's a good thing I've got my Kate's Ag tote bag that's made
in the US any sitting right next to me I have two of them actually I have one here and one
here and I like them very much to carry things around I'm always carrying my tote bag with
me it's a very clear day we've had some foggy days in Montana from all the fires around
us which is really sad and it's also been super hot it's been about a hundred degrees
Fahrenheit each day in Montana which is about 35 degrees Celsius so it's super warm I see
a combine operation straight ahead well I actually don't see the combine I only see
the grain cart in the grain truck but I have to assume that there's a combine oh it's way
over there okay that makes more sense this is the same field that burned from the video
I did last year titled Massive Montana Field Fire it was really bad burned over a thousand
acres and a good portion of that was on our field it wasn't our fire but we were still
heavily impacted by it and you can actually tell where the fire burned because that part
of the field the wheat did not grow very well so I'll insert some Drone footage from the
fire and kind of to show you how much damage it did to this field Darcy and our grain cart
driver were just on the radio I guess there's a really big fire east of here I can definitely
see Flames definitely burning one of our Fields it is already past the Coulee this is a huge
crisis and we might have to move Fields right now yikes that's bad
and then what's also really unique and cool is I seeded this field also this is where
I had my big mistake actually by plugging the drill completely by not picking it up
when I was turning around so it's so nice to see the farming practice come full circle
oh my goodness it's an owl oh that's the most adorable owl ever oh my goodness
there's the owl how cute I always love to see wildlife in the swaths and in the field
because it makes me so happy