The scurs were persuaded by the Weather Eye that we would receive yet more million dollar rains. The temperature reached the 90s making everyone icky and sticky. Will our temps and rainfall moderate or are we in for another sauna treatment? Starting Wednesday, mostly cloudy with highs in the mid-70’s and lows in the low 60’s. Thursday, mostly cloudy with a slight chance of evening rain. Highs in the mid-70’s with lows in the low 60’s. Mostly cloudy on Friday with a modest chance of showers and thunderstorms. Highs in the low 70’s with lows in the upper 50’s. Saturday, partly sunny with highs in the mid-70’s and lows in the low 60’s. Partly sunny for Sunday with highs in the low 80’s lows in the low 60’s. Monday, partly sunny with a slight chance of showers and thunderstorms. Highs in the upper 70’s with lows in the mid-60’s. Cloudy Tuesday with possible a.m. showers and thunderstorms. Highs in the low 80’s with lows in the mid-60’s. June 21 marked the summer solstice and our longest day of the year. We’ll have 15 hours and 28 minutes of daylight, with the sun setting at 9 p.m. CDT. The normal high for June 21 is 81 and the normal low is 60. The scurs will be saving shekels on their lighting and heating bills in the knowledge that soon the days will begin getting shorter. After last winter that’s the last thing anyone wants to hear.
Crop progress responded to our heat and long days. Corn really shot up last week with early planted corn at V10 – V11. Corn is 4’ tall in places and improving color has increasingly shown signs that the nodal root system has kicked it in gear, grabbing some of the nitrogen some feared was lost. It has generally been too wet to apply any additional N with ground equipment anyway. Some of the early planted fields of soybeans were not to be outdone with blooms appearing as early as last Friday June 15. The heat and wet conditions have been problematic. However for dicamba applications with very few hours that would’ve allowed applications to be made within the label. This leaves operators with little alternative in much of south central Minnesota after June 20 other than finding suitable alternative herbicide treatments. Area small grain fields continue to look impressive although more moderate temperatures would be welcome. Haying has been difficult for those with many acres to bale; simply not enough drying weather with the frequent rainfall and changeable forecasts.
Sunday meant getting a handle on the pasture weed control. The large, ugly patches of nettles, Canada and bull thistles were on my list. I wasted no time concocting a witch’s brew intended to control all of them at the same time. I really didn’t relish the idea of spot spraying the weeds twice, as hot as it was. When I finished I was wringing wet but had accomplished my goal. The next day following the heat and overnight rain it looked as though someone had really lowered the boom on them, their heads bowed in submission. Few things channel my inner farmer like making perennial and biennial weed lives miserable in a pasture.
We did manage to plant some garden Sunday after debating whether or not it was worth the bother. The small garden that usually is planted mainly to flowers wound up home to nine tomato plants and some zucchini. As usual blue salvia and 4 o’clocks were still planted for the hummingbirds and sphinx moths. I needed to answer a burning question after saving seed from last year. Do red 4 o’clocks breed true or do they cross pollinate resulting in a variety of colors? A few cannas were poking their heads out although some of them appeared to be coming from seed based on their location outside the row. The heat Sunday made us glad it was only a small garden. The .72” of rainfall overnight was a godsend though, causing more cannas to emerge as well as watering the tomatoes and other transplants in for us. Couldn’t have planned it any better.
Elsewhere around the yard the apple trees are loaded thus far. A pleasant surprise has been the appearance of pears on the pear trees. The Parker tree has about two dozen on it and the Patten has a handful scattered around on it. Having never seen pears develop before it has been intriguing. As one might’ve guessed, so far they’re behaving like little apples only pear shaped. It would be nice to have a few of them actually make it to see how they taste. I’m guessing the birds will probably be in the hunt to taste test them as well.
At the ranch about the best thing about this wet weather was the fact we could get rid of some cull ewes and rams. The trailer was backed in and panels were erected to load them. As if on cue the Cheviots were wired, with several knocking down or jumping over panels and gates, getting into pens where they didn’t belong. Some of the panels were 4’ high! A recently purchased outcross ram knocked his panel down and was tearing around with the new crop lambs. If he hadn’t cost some money and looked so good on the move he might’ve been on the trailer too. He did get a new (unprintable) name in spite of all that. We did finally get everyone where they belonged thanks to help from the local sheep shearer. It’s rare to raise a good ram so it’s always a relief especially to get rid of yearlings you’ve been speculating on. Usually no speculation when it comes to their usefulness. Not unlike many juvenile male humans apparently their primary purpose is to consume a lot of feed and wreck things.
See you next week…real good then.