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Issue 32 |
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Prairie Grains is the official publication of the Minnesota Association of Wheat Growers, North Dakota Grain Growers Association, South Dakota Wheat, Inc. and the Minnesota Barley Growers Assocation. |
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Copyright Prairie |
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Prairie Ramblings What gets your vote for skankiest farm chore? By Tracy Sayler
• "Probably the least favorite job for me was anything that had to do with sheep, from lambing to shearing, to herding, to feeding lambs, to watching them look at you and fall over dead. Something just did not seem to fit with that particular livestock..." (Rick Vallery, Pierre, SD) • "Boy can most of us gals find scads of these! 1) Pulling the plow apart, first time/last time for that one; 2) Driving a tractor that I have no idea what all the levers are for; 3) Going for parts when I don't have all the info." (Donna Ulseth, Crookston, MN) • "Cleaning the twines out of the flails on the back of the manure spreader. Chicken plucking - there's just something about the smell of scalding chicken feathers and flesh right after breakfast. Cleaning out a combine cylinder plugged with canary grass. (It) makes barley dust feel like talcum powder. Pulling weeds in newly planted, half-mile long shelter belts. Tough to pull a lot of self esteem from that job. (The gang at the Red River Farm Network, Grand Forks, ND) • "Cleaning out the chicken coop at the end of June, beginning of July on a nice warm 100-degree day. Picking rocks on newly-rented land that hadn't been picked by others for a half century." (Paul Thomas, Bismarck, ND) • "Castrating pigs, helping mom cut the heads off chickens, walking beans and working in the hay mow when it's 100 degrees, scooping soupy hog manure into the spreader on a ice cold day, trying to clip a cow or heifer that doesn't want to have a haircut, loading sheep or hogs that refuse to go up a loading chute and packing haylage in a Harvestore silo when you're on your knees and it's coming up the blower faster than you can rake it away—you feel like you are going to smother." (Harlan Persinger, Brookfield, WI) • "My husband chose swathing as his least favorite job. It's 'boring,' he says. I think his allergies and the fact that he's missing some of the combine action is also a factor. I absolutely detest hauling grain in sub-zero weather. The auger doesn't work right. The trucks don't want to be there and fuss forever until they finally give in, turning over their engines. My fingers and toes scream with pain from the cold. I feel like I have gained 40 pounds as I try to move around and drive in my winter wardrobe. Sometimes we end up moving snow before and after each truck load (what a waste of time). When it gets really bad watching the truck load, I beg to be let inside the bin to shovel—did I mention how much a loath shoveling in the bins?" (Betty Thom, Edgeley, ND) • "Hauling manure on a windy day and no matter what direction you park the truck, the wind always seems to change just as you dump the bucket." (Kent Heinle, Mandan, ND) • "Trying to get your cheap-skate neighbors to sign onto a ditch petition. Changing a broken walker on a Massey combine. Trying to talk your way out of a ticket on an unlicensed, overloaded truck. Trying to keep a straight face when going over your over-optimistic cash flow projections with your friendly banker." (Marv Zutz, Red Lake Falls, MN) • "The worst job I had on the farm was after a severe spring flood during which we had two steel bins full of wheat get flooded. I spent three long days hand shoveling the rotten, moldy, smelly wheat into a truck to haul out. (it was beyond puffed wheat). It took along time to get that smell out of the skin!" (Greg Anderson, Fergus Falls, MN) • "Cleaning the bottom of the manure holding tank; removing a days-dead calf in pieces from a cow; cleaning a retained placenta; lancing an abscessed lump on a calf; cleaning wet moldy feed out of holding bin; shoveling barley." (Lance Gaebe, Bismarck, ND) • "I will predict that most of your skanky jobs will include but not be limited to some sort of story involving rotten grain. Yes, we can all imagine that wet grain can have an unpleasant odor, but unless you have experienced it, there are no words to describe the stench of decaying commodities. But let me try! The gold standard is of course wet wheat at the bottom of the bin, usually near the door where moisture seeps. In severe cases the right combination of moisture and temperature can produce a substance that is a yellowish brown and smells like a 50/50 mix of diarrhea and vomit. Don't ask why I know what that smells like. One needs a strong stomach to shovel this out the door. I do recall a time when a clump of this "puke" was growing below the roof door. When I entered the bin, my movement was just enough to disturb this chunk which fell, hitting me on my head and back. Eeeeewwwww! 'Is that a new after shave honey?'"(Ron Anderson, Hallock, MN)
(The views in this column are those of the author, and not of Prairie Grains or the associations that publish it. The author encourages suggestions and input from readers, which may be emailed to tsayler@prairieagcomm.com) |
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Not counting bookkeeping and grain marketing, what is
the most rotten, reviling chore you've ever had to grunt through on the farm? I asked a handful of farmers and people with farm backgrounds what they would choose
as the skankiest farm chores they've ever had to slug through. Here are their votes for thickest farm glop and grime. I'm sure some of your favorites are on the list—I know mine are.