Corn Growth Journal, Week Three

Week 3...and 3 kids!!

Another week, another picture! It's hot, dry, and right at the moment sticky, sticky, sticky! So, we headed outside to take our weekly picture...minus Jack, as he was napping.

Joe is a little nervous about this picture, as the corn is kind of rolled up, but that's thanks to the lovely 90 degree temperatures we have had and the seven drops of rain we have had this week.

Anna, as you can see, is helping me by holding the yard stick, as the corn is now way too tall for a ruler (yea!). It measured approximately 20.75 inches (we were uber-scientific, as I didn't zoom in on the measurement...so we checked the words on the yard stick. Thanks, Dodge Trucks!).

20.75 inches! And Anna's Crocs!

Anyway, we also had our corn sprayed today, and all you anti-spray folks can quit gasping, because I went out and took pictures of the whole thing and am happy to report I have not lost any hair and haven't sprouted any new toes or eyes or anything.

In all seriousness, however, Joe explains this application like this, and I quote,

The sprayer, working its magic...right behind my house!

This sprayer is applying the planned second pass to kill any weeds in the field and to hold back any more weeds until the corn is big enough to shade out the middle of the rows so no more weeds can grow. We hire Crop Production Services (CPS) to apply the herbicides because they own the most up-to-date technology that includes GPS swath control that makes sure every part of the field is sprayed and no part is sprayed twice.

Can you tell he was a teacher...and a good one at that??

Anyway, life on the farm rolls on...just as the dust rolls off of the road. Thankfully, today, also, Dad and Joe have taken care of that mess (literally) by rigging up a water truck to spray down the road. There's a graduation party going on about a half a mile away, so our traffic is up, but since the road has been watered down, they have slowed down. Take that, townies!

The dust truck

What a day we have had...add in a long run, trip to the grocery store and Wal-Mart and friends for dinner, and I'll say it's been productive!


Happy Saturday!