The new disc

business meeting

Remember how Garry and Max had decided to buy a used disc? Yeah, while we were away Max tried it out and decided it just wasn't heavy enough for what they wanted, so ...















So they bought a new heavy disc. You may remember (if I wrote it, I remember anyway) that the first disc they tried was too heavy for the new New Holland tractor, and they would need weights for the front to keep the front tires on the ground. Max improvised because they were not in stock. Garry took a couple of photos that he posted on facebook after we got back.

The front of the tractor, the tire is the weight. The bar across the front is to knock down the
sunflower stalks which cause havoc with the tractors, tearing at the wiring

Also while we were gone, and before it rained here (the rain came earlier at the seaside, you'll see in part two) they filled the shed with sunflower seed. Like really filled it.




This week they are selling some to Cargill to pay for the disc (new ones are more expensive than used but better!) and buy fertilizer for the wheat because they can start planting now that it's rained.







Yesterday four big trucks were slowly loaded and sent away, I believe there will be three today. Sunflower seed is so light you can really fill the trucks to the top. When they are selling wheat, not a lot goes in before they are full because of weight restrictions.

The sunflowers almost made class one (the best for selling), and they think they got almost 4 ton per hectare or 117 bushels per acre for the best fields.The really good news is we sold these loads just before the price dropped, and that they are worth more than last year. There will be one more field to harvest later, "the bad field" the one where they had fungus and parasite problems and so it has more weeds, after frost kills the weeds they will combine it.

That's Max's brother Artom who was moving seeds over the auger 

As we were going out of the village to buy more supplies for the Crawford's house (they are arriving in October) we saw two of the trucks pulled over, they were pumping up a tire on one.







Yesterday we picked up paint, hopefully we successfully matched Canadian paint chips in an email to the choices at Nova Lena to the right colors of green and taupe. Garry is teaching every morning and working on the house in the afternoon. I will be grouting the kitchen floor tile as soon as he finishes installing cabinets today.


I picked up apples under the trees yesterday and froze some for pies. Only one more big bowl to finish today. There are a few pears to get yet, the rain really brought a lot down, and its a shame to let them rot under the trees. I am teaching "culinary" as the students call it on Thursday and it's going to be all about applesauce, pie and cake I think, starting with picking up apples under the trees.