Mapping with a pup

Partner in mapping crime

There once was a pup who treed a rat. This rat had once made his home in the fall rye just south of the farm yard. At the combines rumbled and grumbled their way through the tough, still slightly green straw of the fall rye the rat escaped the devastation. As noted by one of the combine operators. My handy hubs was watering our young willow tree when Scoots caught the rat’s scent and chased him out of the bushes, they raced towards the tree line where Scoots triumphantly treed the bugger. Hubs dispatched the rat just as Spock sauntered up to check out the commotion. Spock the tomcat got a free meal and nice nap just for taking a walk that evening. Versus the nearly constant catnaps, in various poses and locations, I’d catch Spock in around the farm. 

The weather cooled off, clouds rolled in and rain looked to be clearly in the immediate future. I was supposed to go map the fall rye field with the gator loaded with gps and monitors. Thunder mumbled nearby and I decided to wait until after lunch for this mapping date. I don’t mind the rain, heaven knows I’ve been intentionally outside in downpours (even waterproofed military-issued boots give up and soak in the wet) but when fancy, expensive monitors are outside of their comfort zone (aka the cab) they don’t play nicely with rain. So there you have it. 

Mounted up for mapping

 When I volunteered for this job I didn’t pick up two key facts: 1) I’d be driving intentionally in the steep ditches and 2) how mind-numbing it is to make a typography map driving every 40 feet, back and forth, across the field. Not going to lie, I kind felt like I was mopping the field with really big sweeps, back and forth, for 24 times. In case you really wanted to know, it takes about an hour and a half to ‘properly’ map the entire field, the ditch and the ditch across the road. The pup wanted to ride with so he got to be in the back in the little box and I’m still not quite sure how he managed to stay in through those ditches.

I thought I might as well take advantage of the sunshine since the earlier rain passed us by. Rub in 50SPF sunscreen (hey, I’m Scandinavian white remember?), grab my shades and I’m ready for some quality time with the sun. Yeah… about half an hour into this escapade, the sun apparently gets shy and more clouds roll in teasing me with thoughts of rain. Lucky for me though, the clouds and all their rain parted like the Red Sea for Moses and went around me and my field. They rained a mile away on either side of me. (It’s really flat here so you can see the mile lines and their trees/identifying object.)  I toyed with the idea of writing a big ‘rain here’ on a white board and strapping it to the gator so the clouds would get the message. With my luck it would literally rain right on the sign and me and those fancy monitors. So I scrapped that idea like a journalist dismisses a blurb about the rescue of a kitten from a tree. Oh well I tried; or thought about trying anyways. 

Rain passing on by

The joys of fall rye will wrap up this evening and then it’s back to the spring wheat! Swathing of the canola will commence next week at the earliest, barring rain. Then it’s a game of tag to the different fields, switching out the machinery and a general race to the bins. We save the ‘touchdown!’ moments for when the grain is sold for a good price. 

May your harvest prep be light, your breakdowns few and the coffee perfectly perfect.