Welcome to my Agriculture Page.

My farming/ranching operation consists of just over 2,000 acres owned and rented. I run 150 stock cows in my cow/calf enterprise. I grow wheat, milo, soybeans, alfalfa, sunflowers, and oats in my farming operation. I also operate my parent's farm trust. I came to the farm in 1974 after graduating from Fort Hays State University with a degree in agriculture. I will post what I’m doing on the farm and how the weather affects my operation when I get time.

January 24,catching up with things.

Just got the web site set for a new year so here we go. Looking back at 2011---it was a really good year for us. We tetered on the edge of a drought all last year but still had some yield from our crops, especially wheat. Prices were the highest ever for everything we sold. Now, in 2012, crop prices are falling some but cattle prices are still riseing! I was reading calf prices at our local auction while eating supper tonight. 500 lb. steers are netting around $950/calf!!! Jobs we are doing on the farm lately are feeding cattle and cutting fire wood. I've been working on rebuilding cattle catch pens. That means cutting lots of large hedge posts out of the creeks and hedge rows. I got one pen rebuilt and getting ready for a second rebuild in another pasture. A week ago I got cabin fever chizzeled part of a soybean field. Speaking about weather. We are a lot wetter at this time than last year. Digging post holes shows moisture down a couple of feet. Temps. in January have stretches of warm weather (mainly high 40s and 50s) then a cold stretch (20s and 30s.

Picture of some of the hedge posts I have cut. Thank goodness for a hydraulic bale bed. I can lift the big ones with a chain hooked to one of the bale arms.

We had somewhat a suprise snow squall Sunday night. I snapped this picture while feeding the replacement heifers some hay out of the barn loft.

I'm a sucker for sunset pictures. I snapped this pic when I finished working on the latest corral project for the day.

Jan.31, storm maybe coming.

Yesterday we had very warm temps for January. Highs were in the high 60s. I took advantage of nice weather and moved ahead on my corral building project. I also chizzled another field Sunday evening so getting a jump on my spring tillage. Yesterday, I met with the crop service advisor. We toured all the wheat fields and planned fertilizer/weed control application. February will be very busy as I have many storm presentations/church projects/beginning calving from heifers/weekend trip to the storm chasers convention, combined with routien cattle feeding. Speaking of storms, the forecast modles have for days been bouncing all around solutions for a winter storm moving into the plains. Today, it is becoming more evident that a storm will affect Kansas Thursday--Saturday. Just what the effects will be is still up in the air at this point. A 60 mile change in the low center track can mean either cloudy, rain or 6" of snow. We need the precip, I just don't like the ice and real cold. We'll see what happens. It's always interesting how the weather will finally shake out.

February 5, nice rain.

We got 1.5" of rain, mostly Friday. The snow stayed along the northern fringe of Kansas counties. Fields and pastures are really muddy when we are feeding cattle. This morning (Sunday) it is clear and cold. I could run over the top of the frozen ground easily when I fed this morning. Next week we will move our spring calving cows home to the calving pastures.