Irrigation 2013

It's September and I've gotten lazy again. Since we are almost finished with irrigation I ought to tell you we have been doing this summer.


Farming in the middle of Nebraska we need to irrigate if we hope to raise a normal crop every year. The picture at left shows the difference between irrigated and dryland.

We have two different water sources, surface and ground. Surface water is diverted out of a river or stream and then transported to the fields by canals or pipe. Our water comes from the Platte River and is brought to our farm by the Dawson County Canal. It is the third oldest canal in Nebraska and was dug with horses and mules about 1894.

 At right you are looking down the canal north of our house. It is already half the size it was at the river 12 miles upstream. The Platte River falls 6 feet every mile it moves east. The canals were designed to fall 1 foot every mile. This way the canal moves away from the river as it moves east.

Ground water is water taken from the ground (simple huh?). Our ground water comes from the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest fresh water aquifers in the world. We are very fortunate to have a very thick water supply that is also close to the surface. We hit water about 10 feet down and the water bearing sand and gravel is about 200 feet thick. This a picture of our newest well, drilled 3 years ago. We do have limitations on drilling new wells, they can only replace old wells.

 We use three different ways to deliver the water to the plants in the field now. My father used two others in previous decades, but newer methods are more efficient. The "oldest" method we currently use is gated pipe. This is either aluminum or plastic pipe that is 8-10" in diameter. There are rectangular holes cut in one side and plastic gates inserted to plug the holes.


Every summer around July 1 we have to string out the pipe on the ends of the fields. I usually recruit some high school kids to help. The pipes are 30' feet long and we put out about 5 miles of pipe so that is a lot of pipe.

This a picture of the water coming out of the open gates. When we are irrigating we have to go to each field and open a new set of rows and close the old rows twice a day. We use old golf putters to tap the gates open and closed. Saves a lot of sore backs.

We use gated pipe on both surface and ground water. Most fields we have a pump on the surface water to pressurize it for the gated pipe. Some fields have enough gravity drop to work without a pump.

Each fall we must remember to flush the gated pipe that is on surface water. There is sediment in the water that settles out in the pipe. The picture at right is just after I pulled the plug. It will flush for several hours before the water starts running clear. If we don't the pipes will have enough mud in them to make it almost impossible to pick up in the fall.


After the last irrigation (and flush) we pull the pipes apart and then find another crew of strong backs to pick all the pipe back up and pile it for next year.

We started using gated pipe in 1975 and until a few years ago that was all we used. Then I purchased a couple of center pivot irrigation systems (left). The look like a pipe in the air with wheels underneath. One end is fastened to a pivot point and the other end moves around the field in a circle. They have sprinklers on them similar to ones in your yard, put more precise.

A new center pivot system is about $75,000 to $100,000 depending on what you add to the package. Normally they need little daily attention, other than to make sure they are still running. We have ours set up to send a text message to our phone if something happens to it. We also have an app to control the pivot from wherever we are. They are more efficient in using water than the gated pipe and take much less labor. Much of the land previously irrigated with gated pipe is being converted to pivots in our area if they fit the field. One downside is that pivots irrigate a circle in a square field so there are corners that will be dryland or will have to be irrigated another way.

The newest irrigation technology is subsurface drip irrigation (SDI). It has been used in orchards and other high value crops for several years, but is now finding a foothold in rowcrops here. I installed this system 3 years ago and am very happy. It is about twice as expensive as a full center pivot on a per acre basis, but if your field is small, rectangular or irregular shaped, it may be about the same price per acre.

This picture shows the valves that control which sections of the field get water. I am currently adding a computer controller to my system so that it can be controlled remotely.

Normally we finish irrigating by Labor Day, but not this year. We will be irrigating until September 14 at least. The crops got behind with some cool weather in August and are not mature yet. If we stop irrigating too soon the plants die early and the yield drops off dramatically.

Preventing Spills

Another one of the many regulations that affect farmers these days is the SPCC or Spill Prevention Control and Countermeasure. While it went into effect several years ago most farmers were ignoring this regulation because the EPA was looking at other industries and not ag. Not anymore.

This regulation states that if you have storage capacity of more than 1320 gallons of fuel and oil on your farm you need to have a spill plan in place and some type of control facility. There are many acceptable ideas and you can self-certify your operation, but like all federal rules and regulations, it takes an engineer and an attorney to understand the rules.

There is a chance Congress may change the rules of the SPCC to exempt farmers, but we decided to go ahead and meet the current rules. One reason is that we are close to groundwater and a creek is less than 100 yards away. This spring we hired an engineering firm to develop a plan and design a control structure for our farm. Most of the plan is "boilerplate" and is identical to many other plans. but it fulfills the rules of the feds.

We decided to build a steel tank with a poly liner to contain our fuel storage tanks. It was easier to install than we thought it would be, the worst was figuring out what went where.

Our plan called for a 12" containment depth, but the side sheets were 33" tall, so we dug a trench with our backhoe to lower them.

We were really dreading installing the liner, but it was remarkably easy. They sent plenty extra and we were able to keep the roll fairly square while unrolling it. 

We trenched the electric line from the old site to the new site. Helps having an electrician live next door.

This is our finished site. We will repaint the 2 older tanks white again. The white paint helps reduce vaporization of the fuel we store.

Sounds and sights of farming

This week I was reminded again of why I love to be a farmer in Nebraska. We started irrigation season and the first week is a lesson is patience and remaining calm. While I want to get every well running the first day, there seems to always be problems here or there that delay the process.

After we get started we have to change our sets twice a day, ideally 12 hours apart. For me that means starting mornings at 6:00-6:30 and finishing the day around 6:00-7:00.

I love the morning sets the best. It is cool and the wildlife is still out and about. Everyday I get to see
deer, turkeys, pheasant, quail, meadowlarks, doves, bunnies, etc. running and playing. while walking along the pipelines I can hear the various birdsongs, the creak of branches and even the far off train horns going through crossings several miles away. It is a very peaceful relaxing time.

I love being a farmer.

Sidedressing Corn

This week the corn is really starting to take off. We are cultivating the first time to loosen the soil and kill any weeds that escaped the herbicide. Next step is sidedressing the corn. No we are not putting clothes on them. Sidedressing means adding fertilizer to the growing crop, right beside the plant. 

We use liquid fertilizer on our farm, but there are other options like anhydrous ammonia and dry fertilizer. This is a picture of the rig we use. It cover 14 rows, 36" apart or 42 feet. We can travel around 10 mph, so it doesn't take long to finish a field. The yellow tank holds 1500 gallons of fertilizer.

Every field gets a different amount of fertilizer. We base the amount we apply on soil tests. This year we are applying anywhere from 15 to 45 gallons of 32% nitrogen per acre now. We are also adding 5 gallons per acre of thiosulfate. This mix equals 60-170 pounds of nitrogen per acre.

 This is a shot of the coulter that runs along the side of the corn. It runs about 2-3 inches deep . Behind the coulter is an injection nozzle to squirt the fertilizer into the slot left by the coulter. This ensures the fertilizer will be absorbed by the soil and then the plant and not volatilized into the air.

Looking down the rows. This corn was planted on May 6, 2013. The previous crop was also corn. We use a three-year rotation. Two years of corn and one year of soybeans. This field has been cultivated once and will be cultivated again soon to form the ridges we gravity irrigate with.

On fields that are irrigated with a pivot or underground drip we do not need to cultivate and we practice no-till on them.

Will summer ever get here?

The calendar says May 3, but the weather says March or February. Here in Lexington we missed the snow for the most part. While we had light snow falling for several hours, there was no accumulation due to warm soil. But it got cold last night, down to 26 this morning.

Eastern Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota and other states got a lot of snow yesterday and today. Iowa and Minnesota got up to 15 inches. That is a lot of snow to melt and then more time to dry and warm up the soil. I have no idea when they will start planting in those areas.

We started planting corn late Monday night on the Batie farm. We put the planter on about 3:00, but had lots of settings to make and electronic issues to straighten out. With the new guidance system we had to rewire the planter as well. Trying to get the guidance system to talk to the planter and the fertilizer pump was interesting. By 7:00 we had it so I could go, not perfectly, but could go.

Tuesday I went pretty hard, after I moved a flowmeter to make the guidance system happy. Still had a few glitches, but was not stopping for that. The picture is notilling corn into soybean stubble. I went until 10:30 Tuesday night and then the rain started. I was moving to a new field and tried planting into corn stubble. With the moisture all I did was rake up the stalks.


We ended up with 0.75" of rain/sleet. Nice rain but oh so cold. I am a little concerned with the cold rain and what it will do to the germination of the corn seeds already planted. There is some research that when corn seeds absorb cold water it hurts germination. Only time will tell.

With the rainout I made an appointment with Hope, our precision farming specialist, to come out and finetune some guidance glitches and tweak the fertilizer pump. Now I think I am ready to go again, whenever it dries out and warms up.

This is not the latest I have started planting. I well remember 1987 when we started the morning of the Kentucky Derby. Why do I remember that day? That was the year I smashed the pinky finger of my left hand. Ten days after I smashed it I got Kenny started planting corn that Saturday morning and then I went into the hospital to have half of the finger amputated. I watched the Derby while laying down in the recovery room.

Here are some pictures of the Integra monitor doing it's thing while planting. I have lots of choices of what I want to monitor while planting. I can watch population, spacing, singulation, skips, doubles, prescriptions, etc.

Chickens

As far as I know there have always beens chickens on our farm. I grew up feeding the chickens, gathering eggs and helping to pluck the broilers when they were ready. After getting married I discovered Barb also grew up doing the same thing. When we swapped houses with my parents to move onto the home place she inherited my mother's chickens.

We currently have a small flock of about 35 laying hens. Barb also raises 50 broilers every year. They are a fun hobby that keeps us and the neighbors in eggs and meat. 

Since Barb is gone for a few days I get to take care of her hens and the chicks that will replace them this summer and fall. We currently have mostly red sex-linked hens, but a few years ago we had chickens of many breeds. Our daughters showed chickens in 4-H and they needed purebred chickens to show. As a result our hen flock was quite colorful and our eggs were also quite varied in color.

These chicks are about 3 weeks old. The little red and black chicks will be the new laying hens. The large white chicks are broilers. They will be ready to butcher in 4 more weeks. They are breed to grow very fast.

Feeding time. We take the feed away from the chicks at night so they don't overgorge themselves. The broilers will actually eat themselves to death if the feed is not limited. In the morning they are starved.





We use heat lamps to keep the chicks warm. The first couple of days we try to keep their house at 90 degrees. Now we are shooting for 75 degrees. This shouldn't be an issue in late April, but not this year. It is supposed to get down to 26 tonight (April 22).






This is our freshly cleaned layer house. With the cold wet weather I helped scoop and haul the chicken litter out to the garden. We use shredded paper for litter. The hens love to scratch it around and it catches their waste and makes clean up fairly easy.

Our 10 hole layer box. This is where we want the hens to lay their eggs. The bottoms are sloped so the eggs roll out to the front. Some hens prefer to make their own nest and we have to go find them every day.

These are the eggs from 2 days of laying for our hens. You will notice the variety of colors including a few that are blue-green. These are from a special breed of chickens that lay eggs with a colored shell. The color of the shell makes no difference to the color of the egg inside.

Happy free range chickens. We have a large area for the hens to run around on. We have an electric fence about 6 inches from the ground to keep the dogs and other critters out and helps keep the chicken in. We also have a taller netting fence on the yard side as well. Sometimes we have to clip the feathers from one wing to keep the chickens from flying out.

Some Truths About Fertilizer

In the aftermath of the tragic fire and explosion in Texas I have heard many half-truths and some outright fallacies about fertilizer. Today I am trying to get the truth out.

First of all, fertilizer is an essential ingredient to modern commercial agriculture. Fertilizer contains concentrated elements that are needed for plants to grow and nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium are the most common. This same fertilizer mixture is also applied to most lawns and gardens across the country to keep them green and growing.

There are three basic forms of fertilizer, each with their own hazards and benefits. I will go over each in turn.

Anhydrous ammonia is the most concentrated form of fertilizer. Is is 82% nitrogen by weight. Anhydrous, as it is commonly known, is stored as a liquid under pressure in those long white tubes that look like a huge salami. At normal atmospheric pressure is is a gas. Farmers transport anhydrous from the plant to the farm in smaller white steel tanks on a trailer and each holds about 1000 gallons.

The benefit of anhydrous is that is is concentrated and requires fewer trips to town to purchase the fertilizer and fewer times refilling. It is usually the least expensive form of nitrogen fertilizer available. Twenty years ago most farmers used anhydrous as their primary form of nitrogen. Today many famers have switched because of the hazards involved.

Anhydrous ammonia can be dangerous if not handled carefully. It will not burn or explode, as has been reported. Since anhydrous ammonia is stored under pressure, if a valve or hose breaks the ammonia will spray into the atmosphere. It is not a poison, but anhydrous ammonia gets very, very cold when going from a liquid under pressure to a gaseous state. It will freeze whatever is in its path, including my father's leg many, many years ago.

Anhydrous ammonia also wants to join with water, that's what anhydrous means, no water. If released near a person the anhydrous ammonia will absorb the water in the eyes and mouth. Too much, too close and it will blind you. But it will not burn or explode and did not cause the Texas explosion.

Liquid fertilizer is a lower concentration of fertilizer stored and shipped in a liquid form. Most common liquid fertilizers used around here are 32-0-0 (32% nitrogen) and 10-34-0 (10% nitrogen and 34% phosphorus). Liquid fertilizer is gaining in popularity because the hazards are much smaller and it is easier to handle. It does require more trips to fertilize our fields.

The hazards of liquid fertilizer are the salts in the liquid. It will burn in a cut or if splashed into an eye. If spilled into a stream it will cause a fish kill, again by too much salt. It would not be the best thing to drink, but it is not a poison. Once again it will not burn or explode.

Dry fertilizer is the medium concentration of fertilizer. It is identical to what is commonly spread on lawns and gardens. When examined closely dry fertilizer resembles little balls. There are many forms of dry fertilizer, some of the most common are 46-0-0 (urea; 46% nitrogen), 11-52-0 (monoammonium phosphate; 11% nitrogen and 52% phosphorus), 0-0-60 (potash; 60% potassium) and 34-0-0 (ammonium nitrate; 34% nitrogen).

These dry ingredients are mixed to create the desired levels of each main ingredient. Dry fertilizer is gaining in usage around here with current prices. It works well with variable rate fertilization, where we only apply how much fertilizer is needed in each area of a field.

Of those listed above none are really dangerous except one. Most are non-flammable and non-explosive. The one exception is ammonium nitrate (34-0-0). It is the main component of ANFO and was used to blow up the Federal Building in Oklahoma City. By itself ammonium nitrate is not going to explode, it needs other components, namely a carbon source and heat and pressure. The carbon source for the Oklahoma City bomb was diesel fuel. Heat and pressure were supplied by a small explosion.

If you want to read of a really bad explosion, Google the Texas City harbor explosion that destroyed the town. This explosion happened on a couple of ships in 1947. Ammonium nitrate fertilizer in cotton bags (carbon) were in a ship that caught fire. Standard practice at the time to extinguish a ship's fire was to seal the compartment and pump in steam (heat and pressure). BOOM.

So what happened in West, Texas this week? We'll probably never know. From reading the accounts of the firefighters and extrapolating from them my guess is this: A fire started in the retail plant. The firefighters thought they had it out. After smoldering for a while it reignited. Some reports say there were propane tanks nearby which would provide the carbon. The wooden building would also provide the carbon. The fire is the source of the heat and pressure.

Can this happen in Lexington or your local town? I would love to say absolutely not, but there is a small chance. All employees of fertilizer plants know how dangerous the products are that they handle every day and they treat them carefully. Reflect that over the 60 plus years of using commercial fertilizer there are only a couple of very bad explosions that have occurred by accident. Here in Lexington the fertilizer plant is in an industrial area and not near any residences.

Final word is that fertilizer is essential for modern agriculture. While there are hazards involved, fertilizer can be handled safely and carefully. Accidents can happen anywhere anytime. We prepare for the worst and expect the best.