Central MN, some are just finishing beans, some are half way done. No one has started on the corn in the 80 mile round trip I make every day. The fields that have beans ready to come out...are too wet to get in to. I'm trapping in a very heavy soil area.

Guys here with beans left that I’ve talked to after we got a little bit of snow the beans gain 3 points of moisture to about 16 percent and some don’t have bin space to be able to get air on them to dry them back down. One thing is if I was in that situation I could dry them with our old roof top. Does anyone on here dry beans with a dryer or do you just let them air dry?

In our area close to Lake Michigan almost all beans get air here and some need drying. This year that may well be the case when we can go in the fields. I talked with several farmers tonight and a mill manager that he and his brother run 700 acres too. They are saying that the may wait on beans until they can travel on frozen ground which will take some upper teens here. Several that were able to harvest their beans were saying middle to lower 50 bushel was common. The beans that are left in the lower, flatter ground are not that good.

Bryce

Bob, we use a batch dryer to dry soybeans. We prefer to harvest dry, however with our proximity to the water, humidity stays elevated, and most of our beans are harvested at 15% or so. We dry them to 13 and keep air on them , stored in bins. The mills dock way too much for moisture, way better off to dry them and store on farm.

John Bruning
Bruning Farms llc

I wondered that I know some still windrow beans in certain areas of the u.s. but rare.

In our climate we would never dare to cut and windrow soybeans. I checked with some drying firms today and more beans get dry than I thought. Not half of them but many bushels get dried. One of the reasons is that around here in most years the beans won't drop below 15-16 percent and leaving them out longer increases field losses so farmers are willing to pay for some drying to save more beans.

We also have to put a lot of air on our winter wheat as that also does not dry down to 13% around here often but air will get them down. Wheat heats up really fast if combined even a tad wet.

Bryce

Over here where I live most of the beans are done and some of the corn. It was late plant here and now for the harvest. There is places that I trap need to wait it out for the crops to be out.No problem then that to set today here get the spots that will work out .

Speaking of manure, or liquid fertilizer, the farmer north of me gets Waste from the local treatment plant and the plant spreads it on his fields.
They drive the trucks right into the field and back and forth they go all the while spraying the liquid.

This was done in Sept if I recall.

I've seen the same with the liquid from large dairy outfits.

Do the farmers have to pay for this stuff?
Any idea on the cost say /acre?

Some crops have been harvested here, but much is still in the field. Wet!

Municipal sludge applied to fields in most cases farmers do not pay for the sludge, the cities are looking for ways to get rid of the sludge. They don't need to buy or rent land which would add greatly to the cost. The sludge is quite highly concentrated in nutrients, especially N. They do follow the phosphorus regs Or P but apply considerable N to the soil. They need and want heavy soils like we have in the eastern WI area as the N will not leach into the ground water.

As to farmers that get liquid dairy manure from dairy farmers? There is a wide range of agreements. Many farmers provide forage and other crops for dairies that don't have enough land base for feed and manure application so the dairies many times apply liquid manure to fields where they buy the crops from. In most cases there is a value placed on the manure based on nutrient analysis and the cost of buying N, P and K. In most cases this is a bit higher than the cost of pumping and application. Most custom manure service providers charge from 1 to 2.5 cents per gallon for pumping and application, so a dairy with say 10 million gallons of liquid manure, say 700 cows will pay about $175,000 to have the manure pits emptied and applied. For rough figuring let us say 1,000 gallons of manure is worth $10 which means the value is %100,000 or it costs the farmer roughly 75,000 dollars more than the manure is worth to get rid of.

Bryce

This is interesting,Bryce. Thanks.

The good part here is at least we’re done so I can trap some if I can get out and set something, here most manure is given away but the person who is getting has to pay for the application which depends on the gallons but most will run between 80 to 120 dollars an acre which is really high for a non guaranteed product. Here its hog manure in liquid so you don’t get the same overall value as the dairy manure because of the roughage in the cows diets also in the hog feed rations here they are putting products in the feed to maximize the nutrient absorption by the hogs so it lowers the amount in the manure so you must apply more gallons to hit the same level of nutrients as before and it cost more per acre.

I am a big fan of manure/ not really cracked over sludge.

I agree about the sludge. Who knows what folks flush down the drain. All kinds of cleaning chemicals, excreted medicines, industrial chemicals, etc find the way to the sewage treatment plants. You wouldn't put sludge on your garden.

Farmers in our area that accept municipal sludge can not raise beets, carrots, green beans etc. on those acres, also manure can not be applied as well, which means there are several acres where organic fertilizers can not be utilized. For those that raise organic crops such as vegetables etc. they use green manure fertilizer and some other treated forms of organic nutrients.

Bryce

What town are you close to in Central KY? Is it your homestead?

To bad the rectums who P&M about food costs do not find and read this. Many have no idea what, where , and how the food got to the stores. Tut