Podcasts I enjoy in the tractor cab

It wasn't too many years ago that the radio of the primary tractor I used on the farm went on the blink, leaving me to find ways to keep myself entertained. Thankfully, radios can be fixed and technology is always making entertainment easier to access. I occasionally listen to the radio, especially if a Mississippi State baseball game is on the air or if the local country station is playing songs from the 70s-90s (I won't listen to the new stuff). If I'm in the mood for music, I'll usually listen to the eclectic blend stored on my phone that ranges from Conway Twitty to Meat Loaf or tune into a 90s channel on Pandora. I mostly listen to podcasts these days, though, and for whatever it's worth I thought I would share some of my favorites with you.

Sports

I was really liking
whatever I was listening to.

• The B&B Show This daily Mississippi State sports podcast is the first I listen to every morning, generally as I'm putting out feed for my milking herd around 6am. Brian Hadad excels in his role of "voice of the fan" while Bob Carskadon provides insight from within the school's athletic department. 
• More Cowbell The second daily MSU sports podcast I listen to is hosted by the oftentimes sarcastic and cynical but always entertaining Brandon Walker, a former MSU beat writer who now works for SEC Country.
• Total Soccer Show Yes, I am a farmer from Lamar County, Alabama, and soccer might just be my favorite sport to watch and follow. TSS puts out an entertaining yet informative daily podcast that provides previews, reviews, and analysis of the week's top matches. 
• Blood Red Podcast  A round-table discussion about Liverpool FC that's published 2-3 times per week.

Political/Current Events

• The Federalist Radio Hour One of my daily "must listens" that focuses on politics and current events with occasional detours into culture and sports. 
• Intelligence Squared U.S. Debates Hour-long debates on current political, economic, and cultural issues published 1-2 times a month.
• Common Sense w/ Dan Carlin I don't always agree with him, but I really enjoy listening to Dan Carlin lay out his viewpoints and arrive at his conclusions in this monthly-ish podcast.

Faith

• The Briefing Another one of my daily musts, host Dr. Al Mohler of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary bills the podcast as "a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview" in which he examines the headlines in light of Scriptural authority.
• Signposts Published 2-3 time monthly, Dr. Russell Moore of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission talks about "the latest books, cultural conversations, and pressing ethical questions that point us toward the kingdom of Christ."
• ERLC Podcast  Speaking of the ERLC, their own weekly podcast offers insights into current moral, ethical, and cultural issues.

Miscellaneous

• The Popcast with Knox and Jamie Billed as "a weekly pop culture podcast seeking to educate on things that entertain, but do not matter," this one often has me laughing hard enough to make me stop the tractor. The Popcast is the jug of 3.5% butterfat in a world full of skim pop culture podcasts.
• Dan Carlin's Hardcore History Every few months Dan Carlin comes out with a new 3-5hr Hardcore History podcast in which he weaves together a captivating narrative from historical accounts of people and events within a certain historical time period.
• This American Life One of the most popular podcasts out there, this weekly radio show usually tells the extraordinary stories of otherwise ordinary people.

This isn't the exhaustive list of the podcasts I enjoy, but these are certainly the ones I listen to the most often. Let me know if you are a fan of any of these, or point me in the direction of any of your favorites you think I might enjoy.

Happy listening, and have a "dairy" good day!

Cows, grass, old tractors, etc.

As March draws to a close, the grass continues to grow, and my father and I have less out-of-town meetings to attend, the activity on our farm should really start picking up.  That's not to say we've just been sitting around the last few weeks, because there's always something to be doing on a dairy farm.

We've continued to have good springtime weather over these past few weeks, and as a result our cows have been grazing nearly every morning.  We're still working on cross-fencing one of the pastures that they will begin to access later this week, and I've already applied a light dose of nitrogen fertilizer to some of the grazed ground.  The cows' milk production has leveled off after the initial increase that came along with the start of their grazing, and they should be able to maintain that production until late morning heat becomes an issue.

In other farm news, our spring harvest will probably begin in two weeks.  Weather will certainly play a role in whether or not it's fully ready by then, but we wouldn't mind starting even if it's a tad bit early since it will likely take us two weeks to complete the harvest.  Our plan is to chop the majority of it, but we will likely try to bale and wrap a few acres worth as well.

Finally, we said goodbye to an old friend this past week.  My grandfather's old IH 1456 tractor was traded off along with our Case 5230 for a '97 model John Deere 7810.  Ol' Red had served us since my grandfather gave her to us about 12 years ago, but she was just one heavy load away from needing to have the engine rebuilt for the second time in three years.  With neither it nor the Case able to reliably handle our feeding wagon, we decided we should swap them out in favor of a larger tractor with more horsepower.  Even though we needed to make a change, I'll certainly miss Ol' Red.

Being "green" on St. Patrick's Day

Today is St. Patrick's Day, and to celebrate I decided to highlight one of our "green" farming practices...I applied some "Water 'n Poo".

We collected soil samples from around our farm a few weeks ago. The testing results we received listed the soil nutrient levels in each field and pasture we sampled, as well as the recommended amount of fertilizer we will need to apply to sufficiently grow our crops. Based on those results, it looks like our captured dairy manure will provide the right amount of phosphorus and potassium in several different places this spring.

You can learn a little more by watching this "GDF MooTube Minute" I filmed while applying the home-raised, cow-generated fertilizer today.

Roadway Safety is a Shared Responsibility

Though I generally can move my tractors over the road from field to field without incident, I do encounter the occasional impatient driver. I’ve been passed after signaling a left turn and around curves, forced onto narrow shoulders, honked at, and been shown not-so-polite gestures of disapproval. It can be frustrating (as this post recounts)! I have also been on the other side of the tractor, so to speak. I too have been in a hurry to get someplace only to find myself “stuck” behind a farmer on the road. Who is right and who is wrong when vehicles and farm equipment find themselves travelling the same roadways?

National Farm Health & Safety Week is being observed September 20-26. This year’s theme, “Rural Roadway Safety…Alert, Aware, and Alive”, speaks to the responsibility of both farmers and the public alike to keep our roads safe for travel and transport. Collisions between agricultural equipment and vehicles are far too common on our rural roadways and often result in injuries or fatalities. We all must accept our shared responsibility to lessen the frequency of these dangerous accidents.

Farmers have a responsibility to display slow moving vehicle signs on tractors and equipment, properly use caution and signal lights, tightly secure loads, and only travel roadways in low light conditions if adequate lights and reflectors make the equipment clearly visible from front, back, and side. We farmers also need to extend a little courtesy and when possible allow following drivers the space to make a clear, safe pass.

Likewise, we need our commuting friends to be alert and aware when encountering our machinery on the roadways. Keep in mind that many rural roads are hilly, curvy, or have narrow shoulders, and that you can quickly meet agricultural equipment without much warning. Always be cautious in such areas were the terrain limits your long range visibility. Please slow down and maintain a healthy distance behind us until it is safe for you to pass. Oftentimes we can see obstacles ahead that you cannot or cannot safely maneuver our equipment onto the shoulder, so please be patient. Use caution and “time” your pass-by wisely if you are approaching us in the opposite lane, especially if narrow or rough shoulders will limit our abilities to give each other more space.

Patience, cooperation, and common sense are virtues we all need to practice when traveling the roadways, whether we’re in a car, a truck, or a tractor. So let’s stay alert and aware so we call all stay alive!

To learn more about roadway safety, check out The National Educational Center for Agricultural Safety and The Alabama Farmers Federation's Farmer at Work Program.

Pass Safely

As I was hauling bovine-generated organic fertilizer to the hayfield this morning, I encountered three drivers who were short on patience, courtesy, and common sense. On two different occasions I was passed after I had turned on my left-turn signals and had began slowing down to pull into the field. Sandwiched in between those two episodes, someone in a car with a state government tag whipped across the double-yellow lines and passed me in the middle of a sharp curve. Luckily, I never had that problem again after I wrote a little reminder on the back of the honeywagon.

Events like these aren't just frustrating, they are very dangerous for the drivers, for the farmer, and for any oncoming traffic the driver may not see. When you're driving down the highway and come up behind moving farm machinery, please be patient. As long as you keep enough distance so that we can see you in our mirrors, we'll move over and slow down the best we can when the coast is clear for you to make your pass.

Let's all practice a little patience, courtesy, and common sense out there on the roadway so we can all live to drive another day!

Same song, different verse

We're having mechanical difficulties again, this time on the tractor that's pulling our forage harvester. All signs seem to point towards injector pump problems, so hopefully we can get it taken off properly and take it to the diesel repair place.

The good news of it is that we didn't have but maybe 8 acres left of cut forage in the field we're in. The baler has been hooked up and is running as I type. I came in for an early lunch to let them get a few bales made before I head to the field with the bale wrapper.

On the bright side, it's gonna be a great afternoon to be on an open-station tractor.

Wednesday morning on the farm - 3/18/09

The sun has come up, birds are singing, the air is crisp and cool...apparently I didn't die and go to Hell for raising livestock (as a couple of nice e-mailers implied I would).

Yesterday was pretty routine on the farm, and pretty wild off of it. No, I'm not talking about St. Patty's Day celebrations, I'm talking about the feedback I received from making comments on this blog and on a couple of others about animal care. If you didn't see them, I and many of my peers made a point yesterday to talk about the high standard of care that's given to animals on 99.9% of the farms around this country. This was in response to HBO's "Death on Family Farm " documentary and the flood of accusations that the abuses uncovered are commonplace in America. Unfortunately, there's too much of a philosophical divide to have a productive conversation with some of these folks making those claims. I mean, they have actually likened my raising of animals to human slavery and the Holocaust!

But that was yesterday.

Today really is shaping up to be beautiful. The stars were out in all their glory early this morning and I don't know if we could ever come any closer to having "perfect" weather. We have several odds and ends to take care of this morning. We'll be replacing the a/c thermostat and rear window on our Case 5230 (and painting it as well); we'll be repairing the front end on our International; and the chainsaw, bushhog, and fencing tools may all get a workout today.

The ground has dried enough that we've been able to start grazing the milking herd again in the mornings. They seem to be slowly picking back up in production after the big dropoff over the wet weekend.

The rain did have an adverse effect on milk production, but it's been great for our spring forages. With plenty of soil moisture, the rye and triticale we planted is really taking off now that the sun's back out and it's getting warmer. I swear I can almost see it growing before my eyes!

Hopefully I'll come back home at lunchtime with a whole lot accomplished and not quite so much hate mail in my inbox.

Feeding Calves

My son Linton loves riding in the tractor with me when I'm putting out the TMR for our milking herd. So, I figured I would let him "drive" his tractor into the calf pasture behind our house and give them some hay. Kind of in keeping with what we did last year, we decided to use this picture on the Christmas cards we're sending out. Unfortunately, I couldn't get him to wear the Santa hat again.

Home again, still hot

While my wife and son went to a water park with a bunch of folks from church this afternoon, I got to make feed for our cows. Really, the only complaint I have about it is that one of the tractors I have to use has a broken air conditioner, which makes it like riding in a greenhouse.

As a response to our cows' drop in production, we began adding water to our TMR a few days ago. It seems to be having a positive impact, as our cows were up about 3 pounds of milk a day. I guess we should have done this a long time ago!

It's still dry, with no real chance except for passing heat-generated thunderstorms in the afternoons.

Long day behind, Long day ahead

I wrapped 135 bales yesterday between 1-8 pm after trying (and failing) to adjust our wrapper to work with a faster tractor all morning. I've got about 75 bales waiting on me this morning with probably another 100 yet to be baled. At best, I can do 30 an hour, but I'm afraid it will be a slow process getting the bales to the spot I'm wrapping and dumping them. With so much left to do, it makes sense that it's supposed to rain alot today. And, of course, the Ford 6600 I'll be running the wrapper with doesn't have a cab or canopy.

Bad Week

Well, this is the first time I've posted anything this week, but it's not for a lack of things to talk about...I've just been too worn out. My folks left on a trip to West Virginia on Wednesday, and things really started happening once they got out of sight. Since that morning, I've had to replace the starter on one of our "can't do without" tractors (had to have a new one shipped overnight), I've had calves out, I've had cows getting into the wrong pastures, I've had two calves get sick, the bucket of one of our loaders wasn't locked in and fell into our feed mixer wagon (which wasn't fun getting out), and those are just the minor things I'm willing to talk about! In other words, it's really been a dairy farm over the last few days.

On the plus side, we got a half-inch of rain on Thursday, and more's predicted for the first of next week!

Preparing for a new crop

We spend time yesterday disking up about thirty acres of land on which we'll sew sudex seed. One of the fields we are going to plant hasn't had a crop on it since we harvested our wheat and oats, so the grounds a little harder and will require a second cutting this morning. We're following the disk with our "do-all", and implement that breaks clods and rakes the ground smooth. We hope to get a little shower sometime this afternoon, and then spread the seed and fertilizer next Monday or Tuesday.

Another hot one

The high temperature today will once again reach into the 90's, with a nice hot breeze blowing. It's days like today that make me happy that we have a couple of tractors with good air conditioners, such as this New Holland TL100.