Illinois Farm Families Blog

You know you’ve had too much rain when your rain gauge can’t measure it.

I cannot remember ever getting this much rain at once. I guesstimated we received a solid 6 inches in less than 24 hours last week. I remember the Flood of ’93, when I wondered if the sun would ever shine again. Yet the river that borders our family’s home farm crested at or near a record high this week. The river in a short time spilled into all the unbelievable places it flooded 20 years ago and more.

In the past week, the stories flowed as much as the excess water. Local schools cancelled. Sump pumps sold out in the nearest city. For a short time, our small town’s railroad viaduct likened a swimming pool. Culverts roared like freight trains.

Meanwhile, our cold, wet fields got colder and wetter. And now some fields need repair before planting.  For many of the region’s farmers, the torrential rain cut soils and moved corn and soybean residue into piles.

The rain gauge and below-normal temperatures are getting a lot more attention than we’d like these days. That’s because “these days” we’re supposed to be planting corn and soon soybeans. As frustrating and mood-dampening as it is, we can’t control the weather. If I could, the highest temperature would be 85 degrees during corn pollination and it would snow on Christmas Day (big flakes, light accumulation).

We’re just anxious, prepped like sprinters in the starting block. And it’s taking a long time for the starting gun to fire. We enter the week of what university experts usually consider prime corn planting time, roughly April 20 to 25 in our area. And we cannot get in the field. We still have time to plant crops into May, and they can be good crops. We keep an eye on the forecast and will feel better when we get through planting season and enter growing season – when timely, gentle rains are always welcome!

In the meantime, we fished in the farm pond on a couple warmer days and completed rainy day jobs. The guys repaired a barn roof. They added windows and doors to a potting shed (rather a remodeled old hog house). Here we care for more than 50 chicks. Most are broilers, intended for meat production and will be shared with family and friends. About a half dozen more will start to lay eggs late this summer.

 

The chicks certainly have been a better sign of spring than the weather.

 Joanie Stiers
Williamsfield, IL

In the farmyard:

• Hauling grain. My family has hauled corn from on-farm storage to processing plants that are buying it to produce ethanol fuel, industrial alcohol, livestock feed and food-grade corn meal. Soybeans go to a terminal on the Illinois River, where it either is railed to processing plants for domestic use or barged downstream for export.
• Field edge repair. Winter provides a good time to clean up brushy field edges. 
• Equipment maintenance. We like the tractors and implements to be ready when warm weather prompts field work this spring.

Inside the farmhouse:

• Bookwork. We “farm” at a computer, a desk in the office, the dining room table and kitchen counter. 
• Tax preparation.
• Paying for and/or placing orders for seed, fertilizer and crop protection products. (a.k.a. more bookwork – bad thing is, bookwork gives me the munchies)

Off the farm:

• Farm trade shows and meetings. Gives us an education in anything from new equipment to trucking regulations and crop insurance.
• Pesticide applicator exam. Our family’s farm must be educated and licensed to buy and apply restricted-use pesticides. 
   

For fun:

• Playing in the snow (or rain puddles!).
• Family board games and card games.
• Extra movie nights. 
• Watching for bald eagles. Our family’s main farmstead is near a small river, which attracts the majestic birds every winter. Pretty cool.

 Happy Winter!

Joanie Stiers farms a little, writes a little and mothers two young kids in western Illinois.

Too much about small towns and family farms falls victim to inaccurate stereotypes. Yet the image of good-hearted, hard-working people generally holds true. (Even if they don’t wear straw hats.)
Our small-town community annually pulls off an amazing and huge Thanksgiving-type feast at our church. We call it the annual Turkey Supper, held the last Saturday in October. We serve turkey and the homemade trimmings to nearly 500 people. The population of our town is 600.
The effort requires 21 turkeys, 81 loaves of bread for dressing, 65 pounds of coleslaw, six roasters brim-full of mashed potatoes, 15 gallons of gravy, 40 bags of cranberries and 23 big cans of green beans. For dessert: 80 pies and cakes! You drool at the thought and certainly salivate at my church’s front door. 
I watched volunteers walk in the church and become mesmerized by the aroma. They shake the urge to eat and take to their stations in the kitchen. The fellowship hall. The Sunday School room. And the choir practice area. 
The effort requires more than 60 volunteers. That includes people to waitress the family-style meal, slice turkey, bake dressing, cut pies and dish food. Meal-time requires a crew in the kitchen and a crew in second room, which serves carry-outs through a front window. Shifts arrive to wash dishes (including 20-plus roasters!). That number doesn’t even include the people who bake pies at home and donate ingredients. The list is lengthy and exhausting. 
As is the work. Hours ahead of the meal, you see people in food-speckled clothes who could benefit from a bath. Or at least a sweat band. We pray a week or two ahead of the event – asking the Lord for strength and guidance in anticipation of the day.
Three generations of my family work the Turkey Supper. My grandma, mom and I all worked in the kitchen this year. Four aunts worked an aspect, too. Several cousins served as waitresses in the past. Our daughter, the fourth generation, helped a little bit last year when we chunked about 80 loaves of Wonder bread for the dressing.
Grandma has been the gravy lady for years. She makes this flavorful topper the way it’s supposed to be: from the turkey broth. She stirs for hours with her arm perched above tall, commercial-type stockpots. 
This year, I inherited Mom’s green bean duties. She instead co-chaired the kitchen operations and washed dishes for NINE HOURS. And like many of us, she didn’t get a bite of it until forking into her carryout meal at home afterwards. 
What a delicious primer to Thanksgiving – which by comparison may be less work!
Joanie Stiers
Williamsfield, IL

A hot meal will stop a working tractor or combine almost as quickly as a breakdown. Proof lies in the power of opening the van’s hatchback at supper-time. The harvest crew, a.k.a. relatives and farm help, start to gather like Grandpa’s cattle when he drives into the pasture with his pickup truck. They simply want a taste of what you brought to eat. Cattle expect a bucket of grain. The harvest crew desires a hot, home-cooked meal or the occasional take-out from town.

Sometimes traditions change and new lifestyles intervene. Yet food delivery to the working crew in the field remains one that some farm families like mine still preserve. Even this tradition has evolved with the introduction of warehouse club memberships and Styrofoam take-out containers.

A field-side picnic seems warm and fuzzy, and it really is in the moment. (In fact, the field remains my favorite place to dine.) But the daily process to plan, prepare and deliver proves a downright hassle sometimes, even for a farm woman who works from home. Often, her roles have heightened with farm records and marketing in addition to traditional farm and home duties.
The nightly preparation and delivery of a half dozen meals taxes the pantry and the mental menu for my mom. I relieve her about once a week, or at least contribute food to the cause. She looks for variety within the parameters of what the crew members will eat. Even then, you have a few short orders, such as warming green beans for the broccoli haters. She knows whether they like mustard or mayo, whether they’ll even put a spoon in yogurt or cottage cheese or need a side of ketchup with their peas (my kids).

At the start of harvest, I shared lunch with our son at a local sandwich shop and watched a farm woman at work. Without asking, I quickly identified that the visibly stressed lady in front of me was taking food to the field. The giveaways: The down-to-earth appearance. Open insulated containers on the table near the checkout. And a multiple sandwich order complicated by her mental recollection of several people’s topping preferences. Usually only wives know a man’s relationship with certain foods. Unless you’re a farm woman. Then you know it for all the farm employees and sometimes their kids.

I confirmed her motive at the beverage station and sympathized. She mentioned her preference to drive a tractor or grain truck. The task seemed simpler and focused. And she hoped no unannounced kids were tagging along in the field that day. Or she would be without a sandwich.

Joanie Stiers
Farm woman
Freelance writer from west-central Illinois

I drove like Rodney Atkins and took the back road to Grandma and Grandpa’s farm. The narrow gravel road seems only a step above a dirt path with a weedy center line. I love that invigorating, countryside drive. I see some of the most picturesque cattle pastures there.

But an unnatural sight hardened the view and stifled its energy. Black cows stood around a water hauling tank on wheels. “The pasture creek must have stopped flowing,” I told the kids. I drove farther and crossed the bridge. Yep. The cattle’s flowing water source rather resembled puddles.

In the same weekend, my husband and I drove to a movie for our quarterly date night. We discussed crops as we passed fields of ill corn plants. He turned bitter. “I just want harvest to be over. I’m tired of looking at this crop.”

This fall we remove the crop and attempt to make this droughty season history.

The general crop outlook across the Midwest proves disheartening. Corn is a grass. Anyone with a yard knows how well that grew this year. Yet, livestock may fare even worse. Imagine an animal trying to graze on your yard. Pasture conditions became poor enough that Grandpa fed his cattle their winter hay in July. Meanwhile, the drought deteriorated field conditions, which produces less hay to restock the winter inventory.

Even after the crop harvest, my relatives and friends who own cattle will witness the drought’s physical impact until it weakens. Short supply of hay. Limited water in creeks and ponds. Poor pasture quality. Drivers through livestock country can expect to see more round bales in harvested corn fields this fall. Cattle will need the baled stalks. The government even released parts of conservation lands to bale for roughage.

Meanwhile, pork farmers face struggles, too. Feed carries an expensive price tag, whether high-protein soybean meal or distiller’s grains from the ethanol plant. In fact, a farmer with pigs told me he struggles to make money, and he grows some of his own feed. An economist says some livestock farms will not make it through the financial losses.

At most, some farmers will get out of the livestock business. At minimum, farmers may sell pigs and cattle at lighter weights or reduce their herd size. But I know farmers prove resilient. This may be the worst drought in a generation. Still, the eldest generations strapped onto similar roller coasters before.

The age-old challenge of weather impacts most anyone’s life, from farms to town parades. And like parade tradition, we march on again next year. We will faithfully plant in the spring with hopes that favorable conditions return. The livestock farmers who weather the struggles will expand. I look forward to when that invigorating scene returns to farm country.

Joanie Stiers
Farm woman
Freelance writer from west-central Illinois

 Our kids made up a rain song with hand motions. (Bible School will do that to a kid.) 

They created and practiced the rain-welcoming song in the van as we drove past corn fields with browning, burnt leaves on a July day. Any green leaves were rolled in defense against the scorching sun. The kids’ performance earned smiles and hugs from Grandma, who spent the previous hour watching rain showers form and fizzle on the radar. The precipitation pattern had dampened our spirits rather than our crops, but the kids made it seem better.

As I write this, much of the Corn Belt is in a drought, and it worsens each day without rain. We need gentle, soaking rains. The kind the kids like to run through with the water sprinkler.

In mid-June, our corn and soybean crops looked great in our west/northwest spot in Illinois. By mid-July, we needed rain more often and weren’t getting enough to adequately deal with the 100-degree temps. Then, the 90-degree days followed. That heat wave mimicked the sub-zero cold of winter to our kids: Uncomfortable and unsafe to play outside for long periods. We pulled out the board games and played in the basement. All the while our crops, garden and Grandpa’s pastures baked like a juicy, medium-well steak approaching overdone with no moisture. So did our yard, but I don’t miss mowing.

The kids were singing for rain, our church friend forwarded an e-mail praying for rain, and the need for rain molded small talk with business acquaintances. Any acquaintances, really. Signs of a darkening horizon prompted a dash to the computer to watch a light shower pop up and fade away like slow-motion fireworks. Farmers practically memorized the date, quantity and field location of any rainfall.

The crop, as I’m writing this, doesn’t appear that it will reach its full potential and likely will vary from poor to good. It’s disheartening to helplessly watch your crops decline. Yet, we are thankful for what we have because it seems far more than our fellow family farmers in the southern two-thirds of Illinois and other states. Corn needs around 20 inches from rains and stored moisture. Our business friend in Indiana by mid-July had seen less than 2 inches of rain since their corn was planted. I’ve heard worse from southern Illinois at less than a half inch.

I’m too young to have grown my own crops in a devastating drought. The last widespread drought was in 1988, when my family had to haul water to the cattle and house wells and when crops burnt up and yielded half their potential. Some areas in Illinois and the Midwest say that dreadful season has repeated.

Crop values rose sharply higher in July in anticipation of a shortage of corn and soybeans, crops found in vehicle fuel, livestock feed, cereal, soda, diapers and batteries. We could pre-sell more crops at these high prices, yet we don’t know what amount we will harvest. You just try not to let the weather situation sour your mood.

And ask the kids for an encore.

 Joanie Stiers

Farm Woman

 

 

 

“Fishing.” Our 6-year-old daughter stated the two syllables with an enthusiastic shoulder shrug when she curled into my lap at 6:35 a.m. one June day. The excitement in the single word near likened the inquisitive suggestion of “presents” on a birthday morning. Instead, she anticipated a planned picnic supper and an evening of fishing at a remote lake with wildflowers nearby.
Summer brings great joy for our kids in farm country. They are thrilled by nature, farm animals, wildlife, tractors, soil for digging and growing, open space, sunsets on what God created and the lightning bugs in the country darkness afterward. 

Minus weather worries, market volatility and gravel roads in the thaw of March, we love living in farm country. And we love raising our kids here. So when Yahoo! Finance posted an article to suggest that families consider a farm-experience vacation over a traditional theme park, I nearly whooped its name. The internet corporation (which, by the way, made a blatant error about agricultural degrees not that long ago) had posted an agriculture article with some truth. The farm in itself provides a place for kids to learn and play -- the types of memorable and educational attributes that define the best family vacations.

I can’t tell you how many times our daughter has sketched the sunset, or likened anything colored with fiery orange to it. Or how infrequently our kids play with toys beyond the water launchers, whiffle ball set and diggers in the garden. Among the most joyous farm play: They catch and cuddle grandma’s barn cats, chase our chickens, fish in the boondocks, and let the pigs chew on the tips of their shoes through the fence. They buckle up in the utility vehicle just for a farm ride and eagerly take late spring walks in the woods. Our 4-year-old son mounts and dismounts every tractor and truck in the farm shed, often twice before I generate an ultimatum.

Give either of them strong magnet on a stick -- the type that shouldn’t touch the fridge -- and they have a mission: Search a farm barnyard for treasures of rusty washers, broken bolts and scraps of fence wire. They bounce in excitement for spontaneous wiener roasts. They identify crops and play “I Spy” on the way to the local, small-town pool. And in farm tradition, we garden. A lot. Without prodding, they willingly help plant, dig and harvest any fruits and veggies within their attention span. On a great day, they eat their servings off the vine.

I have a cousin with a big-city, L.A. upbringing who can see the Pacific Ocean from her college dorm room, yet she chooses to spend her Julys on our grandparents’ farm. She fishes, paints the barn, checks cows, picks green beans, plays ball in the farm yard and pokes fun at our traffic count.

She realizes that the farm is as much a lifestyle as a business for our family and most of the 94 percent of Illinois’ farms that are family owned. Farming and country life are in-our-blood passions that keep us out here, 22 miles from a stoplight and more than a marathon away from the rolls with cinnamon honey butter at Texas Roadhouse. Though, we sometimes crave them as much as fishing.

Joanie Stiers
Farm Woman    

                                    

                                        

We spotted the first round bales of the growing season on the way to our small-town high school’s graduation. And more on the way to town for groceries the next day.

There they sat, rolled tighter than a homemade cinnamon roll, and quite larger than Grandma’s baked treats, weighing about 1,500 to 1,700 pounds at a 6-foot diameter.

I like my cinnamon rolls on a cold winter morning. Same for grazing cows, which eat on round bales when the pasture grass doesn’t grow or grow well. Definitely in an Illinois winter. (Or a summer drought, heaven forbid.)

On those travels we never saw a tractor in the field. As seems typical. A friend once likened the appearance of round bales to that of raised mole tunnels in the side yard. You find the result, but often miss the action. 

Though we never saw the tractor, our 4-year-old son described the process all the way to the graduation. He has witnessed the action from the buddy seat of the tractor cab with bale-making relatives and watched the procedure on his “tractor movie,” a DVD of farm equipment at work. Then he imitates the event through play with his own toy tractor, baler and set of six bales. Granted they are 1/64th the size of the real thing. (Don’t ask me to locate the full collection.)

 It’s interesting we usually miss the debut of the bale or its associated activities because a tractor generally is present four times in the process of a single cutting of hay. A tractor mows the alfalfa or grass. A tractor rakes it into rows. A tractor pulls a baler that forms the bales. Then a tractor moves the bales. So when I drive by on another day, they’re lined up at a field edge or an out-of-the-way grassy area, becoming an ideal spot for kids on the farm to climb and leap. 

A few farmers even move a round bale or more to near the road as fun yard decor, stacking them into “bale people” or adding oversized replicas of turkey feathers for a fall-time greeting. Regardless of use, large round bales are an often-photographed, iconic rural symbol and add a pleasing texture to an otherwise uniform landscape of corn and soybeans in areas of the state where cattle graze. A photo of round bales even is a desktop photo choice on Windows 7, on which it is the only photo that some-what resembles the Illinois landscape. Albeit the photo was taken of straw in the state of Washington and uses twine to secure the roughage. In fact, if you look closely, you can see a loose piece trailing off the screen.

Nowadays, most round balers are equipped with weather-proof netting, or “net wrap,” which replaces twine and eliminates the extra step of adding a plastic wrap to protect the bales from the weather when stored outside. My farming relatives use net wrap today, but as a kid, our round bales used twine and I remember helping slide those thick plastic wraps onto the bales. It was like putting a pillowcase on a brand-new pillow, except you can’t shake and squish a bale. 

Then again, what am I griping about? I never pitched loose hay or tied wire bales by hand like my Grandpa and Great Grandpa did as kids on the farm.

They deserve the cinnamon rolls.

Joanie Stiers
Farm woman
Freelance writer from west-central Illinois.

 

 A full tank of gas. It’s not even on the emergency supply list of the often publicized “Ready.gov” web site, which rather touts lots of water, a three-day supply of food and items for shelter. Yet, panicked Americans lined up to buy gasoline on 9/11 -- with enough urgency to sometimes cut in line to get it.

Illinois farmer Terry Davis was driving to a meeting on 9/11 when his wife called and shared her upsetting story from the local gas station. He was aware of this gasoline craze, having observed the lengthy lines at several stations during his travel. But more shocking to him were the barren grocery store parking lots.

“It occurred to me at that moment that we were much more concerned about the next tank of gasoline to go in our car than whether or not we’re going to have food to eat tomorrow. We take it for granted that there’s always going to be something at the grocery store.”

Americans, in general, lack respect and appreciation for food production, and this fourth generation corn and soybean farmer desires to educate those who take it for granted. “If I had the choice between buying a loaf of bread or buying a pair of Nikes, I know which line I would get in,” he says. The Davis family made sure to buy bread and milk that day. They knew a fuel shortage would mean no deliveries to the grocery store.

Terry felt compelled to share his 9/11 story to the nation in late March. He was one of 10 farmers selected to give testimony on farm policy at one of four nationwide Farm Bill Hearings of the House Committee on Agriculture. The hearing held in Galesburg, Ill., carried an exhilarating bi-partisan mood and respect between some of the nation’s top policy-making congressmen and everyday farmers from five Midwestern states who collectively grow corn, soybeans, pumpkins, rice, fruits and vegetables and raise pigs and cattle.

The event accommodated five minutes of open microphone time from each farmer panelist. And while each farmer, including Terry, had a written testimony previewed by Washington, he chose to adlib a little to share his 9/11 story. It occurred to him after more than half the farmer testimonies focused on farm bill details that the congressmen, the 300-member audience, the attending media and anyone listening to live radio or webcasts of the event needed to be reminded of the farm bill’s purpose. The farm bill, formally known as the Food, Conservation and Energy Act, is what tries to guarantee a sustainable food supply.
“We’re so worried about the how that we forget to ask why,” he told me later.

It likely would take a food shortage before Americans, as a whole, respect our food system and its current availability and affordability. As it is, our country spends less on food than the rest of the world.

Terry shares this analogy: Car companies that make too many cars can shut down the production line for a day or two to bring production back in line with what can sell. But America cannot recover from a short “day” of food production, which rather is a full growing season.

Congressman Leonard Boswell of Iowa clearly indicated the growing demand for food at the hearing: “We’re not making more land. We’re making a lot more people.”

And those people may want to drive, but they need to eat.

Joanie Stiers
Williamsfield, IL

As a tax-paying adult, anything that requires my money generally is “too expensive.” Gas. Cell phone plans. Taxes. Insurance. New minivans. Taxes. Our children’s future college education. (Shudder.)

Last week was my reminder that food should NOT be among them. It was Food Checkout Week – the week when an average family of four like mine earned enough money since Jan. 1 to pay for a year’s worth of food. We as Americans spend less of our disposable income on food than any other country in the world. And fewer than 2 percent of Americans produce it!

In other words, our food is the most affordable on earth in part because of the productivity of farmers and ranchers. That puts my grocery bill in perspective.

The Farm Bureau has touted food’s availability and affordability for 14 years, creating a calendar-marking Food Checkout Day to mimic Tax Freedom Day, the day when the average American has earned enough for the year to pay for taxes. (Which, by the way, is weeks away.)

I attended a Food Checkout celebration last week. Yeah, sounds corny. Actually Captain Cornelius was there! Anyway, two committees of our county Farm Bureau and the local Corn Growers association organized a live, broadcasted grocery race on Friday. Two morning show personalities from our local country radio station were the celebrity racers and teamed up with two listeners, who won a call-in contest to participate. The two teams had five minutes to buy up to 104 items on a specified grocery list, such as canned peaches, spaghetti sauce, ketchup, pretzels, crackers and V8 Splash. The list was formed with items that contained corn ingredients. The shoppers earned bonus points for items that included corn sweetener.

Besides putting food prices in perspective, our local farmers also wanted to bring some awareness to corn sweeteners, which have been given a bad rap by some food marketers. Unfortunately, the name high fructose corn syrup doesn’t sound pretty, but it’s really just corn sugar, is nutritionally equivalent to sugar and equally should be used in moderation. A local young farmwife baked some low-fat banana and oatmeal breads for the event using corn sweetener in place of granulated sugar and gave free samples. Yum!

At the checkout, everyone was a winner. The race was hilarious, with attempts to snatch items from one another’s cart, playful wrestling in the baking aisle, and asking nearby shoppers for directions to the gravy. Then, our local food pantry received the $215 worth of groceries collected during the race.

Joanie Stiers
Williamsfield, IL