DPH

80+?!!!!!!!!!!! We call dat a hurricane down here.

Under Winter Weather advisory here (first one in many years) Most of last week our temperatures were almost near 80 F. Monday, the temperature was 75 F at 9 am. By 9:15 am the temperature had dropped to 55 F. By the evening we were in the 40's. Yesterday it didn't get warmer then 38 F with the wind blowing and small drizzles frequently. Last night, there was a threat of bridges icing over. They are still giving warnings of possible sleet and freezing rain, but not nearly as likely as last night. I a warm weather guy, I think 95 F in the shade during the summer is quite cool and pleasant. I don't like freezing weather. I miss being able to wear shorts outside, and riding in the car with the windows down and the sunroof open.

You should see him today, he's even worse since LSU won the Sugar Bowl last night.

Here you go. We run these in the water to level the fields before we plant rice.

Well its a New Year on Hinton Farms. That means the rainy season has started and the fields have started to fill with water. It also means that the crawfish traps will be set in those fields soon. We decided that since the weather is mild and it is much too wet to do anything else, we were going to inspect our rice planting equipment. First up, I had Dwayne pull the 9270 and chisel plow up to the shop. After we set it up for New Years Plow Day, one of the guage wheels broke, so that needed fixing. There was also a hydraulic hose that was about to bust so we replaced that too. Next are the waterlevelers. We have to inspect these closely, you don't want to break down in a flooded field with one of these. We had to do a little bit of welding to the one hooked to the stx. The one on the John Deere had a few more problems that needed to be fixed. After the waterlevelers were done, I sent Dwayne to the old farm to pick up the bufalo and the chisel. We used these on a limited basis, mostly for rutted land and old crawfish lakes. The buffalo was still in good shape, but the chisel needed a lot of work. There were a few missing shanks, and a wheel that needed to be replaced. I sent Craig out to the Deere and Case dealers to get some new mud guards for the STX and the 9220. We put them to guard the exposed parts of the engine from all the water and mud during the waterleveling. Well thats all for now. Questions/Comments Welcome.

Thanks, yes it is 64th scale.

Three of the bins are the ertl ones, the tower and two large bins are from Standi. I painted them silver to make them look better. Thanks for all the comments.

I've been kinda quiet for a while on here, but with school and work taking up my whole life, I don't have much choice. This week is finals, but I decided to take some time from studying to relax and work on my display. The old field is gone. A new field will be built hopefully next week. I have taken a lot of suggestions and ideas and melded them into my new display in the works. First off, a new pole shed for storing equipment thats not in use. After some Paint. Next up, the grain bin system has gone back up. I found another bin set the other day when me and a friend went toy hunting. Decided to paint them silver to make them look more realistic. While I was outside waiting for paint to dry, I decided to have a little fun. And now the finished result. This will be an offsite storage for unused equipment and for the grain system. Thanks for the idea Mississippi Man. I also added homemade power poles for detail. Finished pole shed with equipment parked in it. Thanks for looking. Questions/Comments Welcome

Sorry I don't really know. Not my ussual type of farming that Im used to but my educated guess would be tons.

Its not ussually raised. In this pic, it is down shreading the tops of the plants. Im guessing that keeps less trash out of the crop.

Um.........Don't you mean Great pic DPH? I wasn't there, so I don't know, my dad took the pictures. I think he only went to one farm and they ussually run about 3 or 4 carts. Sugar Cane is harvested every year, but it is only planted every two or three years. It continously grows back but the yields arent good after three years.

Heres some pics my dad took from down in Thibodaux (Tibudo) Louisiana. This area is Sugar Cane Country. Obviously Thanksgiving isn't even a reason for them to stop, but they do race against the weather with harvest starting in Early to mid November and often ends up as a wet harvest. Being a little to far north to experience this for myself, Im not too familiar with the practice but I can try to answer some questions. Field Work: Heres some pics he took of the trucks getting to the sugar mill. Don't know if this was in Thibodaux or Raceland just down Hwy 1. I have absolutly no idea how this works ha ha!. Enjoy! and Happy Thanksgiving.

Hey guys been a while. Couldn't find a topic like this, but if there is one, please merge this or move it or what needs to be done. Been extremely busy with work and school. Notice social life is not included. I figured Marky Clouseau would be interested in this. Well Thanksgiving is here and suposidly my time to roll out my produce department and make it shine, right? Well I don't feel I've been given the chance. First of all Im expecting big deliveries. Ours are about 9-10 pallets normally. Friday we got 16 pallets in on the main truck plus a separate pallet of bell pepper and chopped onion/pepper mix. I would expect some of this stuff to at least be the normal stuff, at least what you might use in a thanksgiving feast. Instead I've got 3 bins full of grapefruit, 2 bins of oranges (bagged), plus another separate pallet of oranges (loose) I've got some of these things out on the sales floor but my normal tables won't hold all of this stuff plus the normal. I could put these bins out on the floor as they are except for one thing. I've got district managers comming in regularly puttin the scare on that some upper management is supposed to pay us a visit but they never do. Being an Agriculture Bussiness major, it really aggravates me when I see stuff going bad in my store room before I can put it on the salesfloor because some idiot won't let me set it up. Also the bussiness part of my brain is throbbing because I know I can sell this stuff and fast but as stated earlier, I can't put them out. Meanwhile I don't have anything else to do, because even in busy seasons as this, keeping my part of the department up is not too hard. Still like my job, and can't even believe Im this passionate about my job at walmart, but I think I may have found my calling until I graduate. I may even try to find a job in the produce field when I graduate (as some sort of management of course). I do like my job (sometimes) but situations like this annoy me.

I'm quite fond of that New Holland, Hope the farm decides on that one. Very nice Steigers you've got there Tim. That NH and ripper look like a mean combo.

I'll refrain for now.

At least I didn't start a 13 page topic about my socks................................or another article of clothing.

Not really, just means more cold wet weather. We are actually EXPERIENCING fall weather. Supposed to be in the 40's in the morning (more like winter for us) and already broke out the long pajama pants.

The year is winding down. Everything is either out or getting out of the field. The weather has cooled down and we are getting the fields ready for next year. But the way the weather has acted this week, this may be the last or one of the last journals for this year. Festivals are starting up too. Last week the Cotton Festival was in Ville Platte and Festivals Acadiens was in Lafayette. As the weather cools we are getting ready to make a seafood Gumbo to celibrate a good year. Hinton Farms We made sure everything was back up to par on the combine. We took the headers off and parked everything in the shed. The stx and the 9220 were brought brought back after they finished leveling the fields. We put the red disk on the stx, and the small disk was put on the 9270. Everything was greased and checked. The stx need some more hydraulic fluid so Dwayne got some. We hooked the two levee plows to the 7210 and the 9220. The 7210 is taking the small plow just to redo some of the levees in the old rice fields. We are "rericing" about 500 acres of the old rice fields, and we repass the levees to get rid of the huge weeds on them. Dwayne and Craig started again plowing the old soybean grounds. Getting ready to leave. After Bobby ran over the field with fertilizer, I showed up with the 9220 to make some new levees. After I finished, I got the 4755 to build up some spots where the drainage ditches used to be. Lafler Farms Mike has pretty much wound down the year. He is out cutting his two top crop rice fields now. After he finishes, that will be it for the year for him. Thanks for Looking Questions/Comments Welcome.

Got to be one of your best journals this year. Love the addition of the pigs. Your pig pen looks so real. I also like that picture with the excavator trying to take out the stump, it looks real.

Fall has officially begun and the weather has been great. Even better, the local meteorologists have anounced that the chances of a hurricane comming into the gulf are slim to nill. That is very relieving that everyone got their crops out without disaster this year. Hinton Farms We decided with the dry weather that we should level out the worst of our fields with ruts from Rice Harvest. The stx was brought back. We switched the red cart onto the 7210 and the stx was hooked to the waterleveler along with the 9220. We sent the 9270 to start disking up the ground again. After the ground was smoothed out a little and a few more weeds gone, the ground was ready to be leveled. It's more of a "maintanence" level than a "full blown" releveling so it shouldn't take that long or that many trips. We will probably plant rice again in this field with the drill. We are still busy cutting the last of the soybeans. These are the late beans that were planted late in the old crawfish lakes. The combine was brought back this morning to be worked on. We finished soybeans and this year we don't have any top crop rice so it will be going into the shed now. Meanwhile, we hooked the levee plow to the MX 135 and started making levees in the old soybean fields. We passed the disk over this land also and spread some fertilizer. A bering was burnt on the green disk, so we shut that down early last nite. This morning we went to find that one of the tires on the wing was flat, so we removed the tire to try to fix the flat. Dwayne got to the field we were leveling early. The stx needed some hydraulic fluid this morning so he brought that out. Craig got there a little later and was ready to take over on the 9220. Lafler Farms Mike has been busy preparing his old rice fields to be planted with rice again next year. The top crop rice still isn't quite ready and the beans are finished. The Versatile runs the disk while the 4455 spreads some fertilizer. The Magnum shows up later with the cultivator. When Mike dropped his son Shawn off this morning, they noticed a broken pin on one of the wings. They took out the broken pieces and Shawn started like that, just can't fold the wing up. Later Mike brought a replacement pin. Thanks for looking. Questions/Comments Welcome

Actually what I really need is two Frieghtliners and a cab over International to make the display realistic to the real farm its modeled after. The cab over is in the background of this pic.

Very when you are working with the fat fingers I have. This is the red one that is already on the farm. It will be staying with the farm though. I plan to do this with my JD disk too, but that one will be more difficult because of the offset wheels they have.

I only wish I had time for booze and women.

I haven't done a custom in a while, I have been working and going to school a lot. Today I had some spare time before work so I tried this, AND IT ACTUALLY WORKED!!!! :wink: Its just a basic mod on the old ertl wing disks that I've modded so many times already. I took the old wheels off, added a small piece of styrene, added a screw and glued the wheels back on so now the disk raises and lowers. Questions/Comments Welcome

In the close of August we experienced some strange cool and comfortable weather. The close of August is called the fifteen days, the fifteen hottest days of the year for Louisiana, but this year was very cool. The trend has followed with low humidity and cool temps, making for beautiful days. Hinton Farms Following rice harvest, many things had to be fixed. We had to make sure that the combine was working completely. Meanwhile, we sent two of the guys out with the 9270 and 9220 to disk up the ruts we left in a few of our fields. We can't leave ruts in too long or the levels that we work hard to get will be ruined. Heading home. We took the stripper off of the combine, and mounted the draper. After it was checked over, we were ready to cut some soybeans. The Rayne Grain cart was hooked to the 7210 while the stx was hooked to the red cart when it finished rolling the buffalo over the stubble in the future crawfish lakes. We started with the field next to the shop. We started in the back and cleared some way for the carts to move around. We don't really "run" the carts for soys, we park them at the edge of the field, then when they are full, we send someone to unload them at the truck thats parked nearby. This year, junior was riding the combine, and it was decided that he had enough experience to unload, so when the cart is full, he hops off the combine and drives the tractor down the road to unload. He's done very well so far. We will be pulling the levees back up in these fields soon. We may disk them if our dry trends continue and then pass over with fertilizer. Mike Lafler Farms Mike has started cutting his soybeans. He only planted three fields this year. While Mike was in the combine, his son was on the Magnum pulling the levees in this field. Thanks for Looking Questions/Comments Welcome