I absolutely love this time of year. The spring
sun is warming up the earth and turning brown to green, the birds are their
most colorful, doing their best to impress a mate and the farmers are busy in
the fields. Leaving Wisconsin we traveled…..well in separate directions. Yup,
she left me again! Daisy, Dakota and I had a 9 hour driving day to the
northwest while Barb flew several hours east. When the day ended I found myself
in Douglas, North Dakota on the Finken/Sobieck farm and Barb found herself at
our daughter’s house in Greencastle, Pennsylvania.
Although we have spent several falls at “the
farm” over the past several years, this is the first time we have spent any
time here during the spring and I was curious what it was like during planting
season. By the time I arrived they had their peas and canola planted but they
had plenty of soy beans and durum to get in the ground.
Having never planted before I was unfamiliar with the steps that needed to be taken to get the seed in the ground. Over the course of the next several days I pitched in and helped them anywhere a rookie like me could do so without getting in the way. Being a "no till" farm there is minimal preparation of the land. They often plants right through the residue from the previous years crop.
Depending on the field they will often spend time picking rocks, digging up boulders and repairiong drainage areas. I spent hours out in the field operating the rock picker slowly but surely removing some of the thousands of rocks that surfaced. The rock picking is kind of interesting. The use a cleverly named implement called the Rock-o-matic. This implement has turning spikes similar to a paddle wheel on a boat that scoops rocks softball sized and larger into a bin. Once the bin is full you use the hydraulics to dump the rocks somewhere off the field.
Rock-o-matic ready for action
Closer shot of the paddles and bin
Once the field is prepped it is ready for planting. One of the first steps is to load the seed into
the semi. I operated the forklift as 50 bushel totes of seed were emptied onto the grain belt and into
one of the hoppers on the semi.
50 bushel of soy beans being loaded onto the grain belt.....
.......into the semi
From there they load one of the three hoppers on
the cart with the seed. (the other two hoppers are filled inoculant that
promote plant health and the third hopper is filled with fertilizer).
From there it gets loaded into the seed drill
Then it is planting time! The planter they use
is an air disk planter meaning it uses disk to create the furrow in the ground
a blower to feed the seeds and the appropriate ratio of inoculant and fertilizer
from the hoppers to each of the 65 furrows spaced 7 ½ inches apart followed by
a packer to set the seed into the soil.
The planter
Next up is the roller, a 45 foot three sectioned
roller that packs and covers the seed.
45' Roller
Last but not least is the sprayer to prevent any
plants other than the beans from growing. This thing is 120' wide so you have to be really careful not to hit trees, fences or any other obstacles.
The Sprayer
Each of these steps are critical in order to
maximize the yield in each field with the planting and spraying being the most
critical. So what did I do? Over the course of the past week I did each of these steps except the actual planting. Screw that up and..... well lets just say they did not want that screwed up. I spent most of my time rolling and picking rocks.
Speaking of screwing up,
I also play another key role at the farm. I am the designated “blamee” for
anything that goes wrong while I am here be it a breakdown, something lost or just a screw up if I am anywhere near the area, and
by near I mean within 10 miles, I am immediately blamed. A key
role which I have become very good at!
Over the past week I rolled somewhere between
900 - 1,000 acres of beans and only had one “screw up” when I lost a bolt on
one of the wings. I am not sure how that was my fault but I was told it was so
it must be……
I have a broken wing!
The other bonus about being here this time of the year are the birds. Songbirds, shorebirds and waterfowl are very abundant right now making for plenty of photo opportunities! In between tractoring I was able to get out several times and take some pretty cool shots of the local bird life.
Snipe
Drake Pintail
Blue-wing Teal
Northern Shoveler
Canvasbacks
Yellow-headed blackbird
Avocets
Marbled Godwit
One of their pivots on an oats field
Meanwhile in Pennsylivania........
Barb's visit was focused around baseball and food. Does it get any better than that? In addition to visiting and spending time with the grandkids they managed to get out to an Orioles game and Shane used his ultimate smoker to cook up some ribs and chicken!
Barb, Jessica and Dylan sporting the Orioles gear!
Shane and his giant smoker
Cutie Kendall up to bat!
Dylan ready to hit a homerun.....
She flies back to Minneapolis today then just a short 8 hours drive to Douglas and we will be together again!
It was inevitable, everybody gets old right? No,
not everyone, not us, we are not old….. Well there were signs…..my arms are
almost too short to read a menu, we are offered the senior discount without
asking, our mails consists of more AARP material than anything else, our
biggest decision of the day is whether to have peanut butter or honey on our
English muffins and yes, I have worn socks and sandals. But the sad truth
really hit home this week. It occurred to us the other day as we walked hand in
hand into our doctor appointments, followed by our joint visits to the dentist
office but it really occurred to us as we were walking into Walgreens together
to pick up our prescriptions. OMG, we are an old couple!!!! Oh well, getting
old beats the alternative…..
We arrived to the Balsam Lake area late on a
Tuesday and the first thing we did was order a pizza from our favorite pizza
place, in fact we ordered it on our way into Wisconsin and picked it up as we
passed by. JJ’s has the best pizza ever!
We arrived at our friend Kevin’s place and set
up next to the horse barn. Since we arrived a day early we had no plans for the
next day so we spent the day cleaning the rig. The dust, mud and snow of South
Dakota had done a number on the outside, throw in a couple of dogs dragging
that dirt inside the rig and you can imagine what the inside of it looked like.
The Filip's Estate
Our home for the week!
We had a full week of visiting planned and first on
our list was my sister Judy and her husband Mike. We met them at our old hangout
The Thirsty Otter for all you can eat rib night. The ribs were as good as
remembered them yet they too were a sign we are getting old. You know you are
getting old when all you can eat ribs consists of one serving…… It was great to
see Judy and Mike.
Next up was our friends Joe and Pam who we met
at Waterside restaurant just outside of Amery. Since it was Friday of course I
had to go with the all you can eat fish fry! (again one serving). We followed
that up with a visit to a new taproom in the area. Amery Ale Works is in the bottom
of a converted dairy barn and well worth the stop.
Kevin, Pam, Joe, Barb and I
Saturday was a big day as we had planned a
family reunion of sorts. Three of my sisters and both my brothers along with
some of their spouses all got together at Kevin’s for a get-together. Kevin slow
cooked a 14# prime rib on his pellet grill and it was delicious!!!! We also had
killer bean bag toss tournament which was won by none other than yours truly
with my brother Bob as a partner!
My brother Rod, his wife Beth and my sisters Becky and Carol
Barb showing my sister Judy and sister-in-law Greta our house plans
Greta and Barb watching Dakota swim
My brother Bob and brother-in-law Mike doing a little shooting
Sunday consisted of a trip over to the Somerset
area where we had a great lunch with good friends Doug and Connie. We also
threw up some “For Sale” signs our property in the area. We are hoping to sell
this within the next year to fund our house building project in South Dakota.
So if you know anyone looking to buy some property in Wisconsin, send them our
way!
We also swung by Hack’s Bar in Milltown to see
our favorite bartender. Julie who used to house/dog sit for us when we lived
here. Then it was back to the Thirsty Otter for bingo night! Who plays bingo
you ask? Old people….old people play bingo, and we play bingo because we are
evidently old…. Prizes consisted of free meals, drink tokens, packages of meat
and cash. We were within one square several time…close but no bingo. I finally
got bingo but so did someone else so we shook dice to break the tie. I lost and
took the walk of shame back to my bar stool without my package of meat. Barb
finally broke the ice on the very last game of the night where everyone throws
in $5 for a cash game. She won $160!!!!!!
Thursday and Friday Barb went to make some money at her old
workplace where she still does some contract work. I on the other hand spent
money getting the trailer tire fixed and went over to my brother Bob’s house
where we spent the day making birdhouses. There a lot of bluebirds on the South
Dakota property so I am sure they need some houses!
Check out the hematoma on that tire!
My brother Bob cutting some side panels
3 of the 8 finished houses
Speaking of South Dakota, our friend Kevin is
going to be our neighbor! Well 15 minutes away but close enough to be
considered a neighbor as he bought a 15 acre horse property adjacent to the
National Forest just outside of Pringle. It is a beautiful site with water,
power and a spectacular view and bonus…it has elk right on the property!
Friday night we drove an hour over to Hudson Wisconsin to have dinner with our old lake neighbors Brian and Chelle. They took us to Postmark Grille a newer restaurant in the old post office building. We followed that up with drinks at Madison Ave. Wine and Spirits. It could not have been a better night, great food, great drinks with great friends.
The downside of moochdocking at the house of a contractor/horse owner is that there is always so much to do. So while we were there we mucked stalls, mowed the grass, unloaded various construction materials and power washed the deck. There is never a lack of things to do!
Off loading some timbers for an upcoming house
One interesting off load involved some prebuilt walls that were too big to unload with one skid loader so what do you do? Get another one and lift up the pallets, have the truck drive out from under them and slowly move the skid loaders in unison.
Truck pulling forward
Drop this and it will cost a few thousand dollars
Our Wisconsin adventure cumulated with a two day visit to our good friends the Anderson family in Spring Valley. We look forward to seeing them whenever we are in the area. They were nice enough to let us crash their Mother's Day celebration.
Barb chatting with Rachel and Ronda
Gloria making banana splits!
We were not able to see everyone we wanted to see but it was a great week of visiting and there is more that I could write about but it is
4:30 and if we are going to catch the early bird special at the buffet and be home in time to
be in bed by 7:30 we need to get moving!
I have two excuses for not updating the blog for
the past couple of weeks…… first, we have had very inconsistent internet. We
have to drive up the road to the top of a hill to get connected and even then
it is spotty. The second excuse is that we lost Barb’s camera and we were
hoping it would turn up. It didn’t……thus very few pictures this post.
We closed on our property in the Black Hills last week so now it is
official! It was a long and arduous search and it feels good to have someplace
that we will someday call home. When is that
someday? We will probably start building very slowly over the next several
years but for right now we are content traveling and exploring this great
continent. First up will probably be leveling the site and running power so we
have a place to park when we are in the area.
We have been out to the property several times
in the past 10 days, walking it, checking out every nook and cranny,
envisioning ourselves living there someday. Besides being home to several
hundred prairie dogs, the property has been used to pasture 3 horses the past
several years. Funny thing about that…… When we asked if the owners knew whose
horses they were they had no idea. A check with the neighbors resulted in some
speculations but no concrete answers. Finally a son-in-law of the former owners
said he thought he knew who they belonged to and would see about getting them
moved.
The property is fenced on 2 sides but the horses
shared our 45 acres with the adjoining 40 acres so the horses had free roam of
85 acres. One thing we learned about South Dakota is that if you don’t want
livestock on your property it is your responsibility to keep them off,
otherwise if there is no fence they range wherever they want to. Very different
than Wisconsin where it is the farmers responsibility to keep their livestock
within their pasture area.
We also ran across something else really cool on
the property. It seems to be home to several Burrowing Owls that have taken
over abandoned prairie dog holes. Stayed tuned as we try to get pictures of
them.
We need to do something to get the prairie dog
population under control. A few are okay but 100’s are ruining the pasture.
Prairie dogs feed primarily on grasses and their roots which in turn kills all the
grasses just leaving the noxious weeds or open land void of plant life. Of the
45 acres the prairie dogs cover about 1/3 of the property. When Barb was
researching how to handle them she ran across an article about what great pets
prairie dogs make! If fact they sell for up to $700 in Japan in $450 in New
York. So to all the readers out there, when you stop by and visit us in South
Dakota you will receive one prairie dog for free!!!!!
Walking the dog town.....
Several readers asked if there is water or power
on the property. The short answer is yes to both. They recently brought rural
water to this road so there is water at the road. All we would have to do is
pay a $2,500 hook up fee and pay to have a pipe trenched the 1,700 feet to the
building site. After that it is $80/month whether you use it or not. The other
option is to install a cistern and haul your own water. Since we are a year or
more away from getting serious about building, we are going to wait and see
which direction we are going with the water.
There is also power in the area so that is
definitely a bonus compared to a few other pieces we were looking at! I also
met one of the neighbors who seemed very nice but then again they were from
Wisconsin as well so of course they were nice!
We had hoped to move the rig out to the property
but a late April snow storm changed those plans so we stayed our final week here
at Country Charm. Well actually 2 nights
for me and 9 nights for Barb and the dogs as I took a 4 day “vacation” and went
to central South Dakota to go turkey hunting with some friends. We had a great
hunt and I was able to get one with my bow.
We did have one traumatic event over the past
two weeks…... The day started like any other. We thought we were moving onto
the property and were taking care of any chores that required power since we
would not have hookups for the remainder of our stay here. One of those chores
included getting my hair cut. Something Barb has been doing every 3-4 weeks for
the past 3 years. But with the first swipe of the electric clippers I knew this
experience would be like no other I had before. Barb gasped as she took the
first swipe and said “I am so sorry” I knew immediately what happened and said
“You forgot the guard didn’t you?” She just kept repeating “I am so sorry…..”
Yup, she forgot the guard and I had a 5” strip shaved to 1/8th inch
on the back of my head! She kept saying that she could fix it but somethings
just aren’t fixable but she tried to blend it as best she could. Needless to
say we got a good laugh out of it once the initial shock was over.
The short strip really brings out the gray!
My friend Kevin returned to Pringle with me after turkey hunting and
we spent a few days exploring our property and the surrounding area. Kevin is a
general contractor and if everything works out he will be the one to build our
place. We played with house designs, picked out a building site, met with the
Highway Dept. to talk about putting in a driveway, talked to the electric
company and several lumber yards. It was a busy few days but we now have a good
idea on several key items.
We left the Black Hills this past Tuesday and
since Kevin had to work the following day we drove the 13 hours in one straight
shot! Have not driven that long in a while and it was very tiring. After being
on the road for the past few years anything over 5 hours seems like a long time
so 13 hours was really brutal. Barb and I drove the truck while Kevin drove the
jeep. Everything went well until the 12 hour mark of the trip when Kevin
noticed that one of the tires on the 4 wheeler trail was bouncing. He stopped
to check it out and found that it had blown a ply resulting in a large bulge in
the tire. He limped it home the last hour very thankful that he did not have a
blowout.
It is good to be back in Wisconsin, it has been
almost a year and a half since we have seen our family and friends in the area.
We are only here a week and I think we have things planned everyday so I am
sure it is going to go a lot quicker than we want!
Few places touch our hearts like the Black Hills
of South Dakota…Other places might include the farmlands of North Dakota, the
forests of Northern Wisconsin or the lakes in Ontario. We have talked about
each of these areas (except Ontario) as an ultimate landing place when we stop
traveling or perhaps slow down a little and the Black Hills is at the top of
our list!
Why you ask? If you have ever been here and seen
the beauty of the area yourself, you know the answer. But there are other
reasons as well.How about no mosquitos?
The abundant wildlife in the form of deer, elk, antelope turkeys and buffalo. For
us, it is centrally located to many of the other activities we like to do and has
all four seasons without a harsh winter. All of these things combined has
really brought it to the top of our list of areas to look for property. This is
probably our 6th or 7th trip out here looking for
property and we have narrowed down our search area and are ready to pull the
trigger!
Speaking of snow I don’t think we have had a day
we have not had snow in the past week. We ran into quite a bit of snow on our
drive to Casper and even more when we arrived there. As a matter of fact we stayed an extra day in
Casper so we would not have to travel in the snow.
Does it get any more beautiful than this?
We had to stop for this herd of elk to cross the road
Headed up the mountain switchbacks
Dakota LOVES playing in the snow!
When we arrived to the Black Hills, we had
originally planned on dry camping at Ditch Creek Campground but a look at the
forecast for the first few days we were in the area called for continued snow
and rain so we diverted to a campground where we at least had power to keep us
a little warmer.Country Charm Cabins is
has a small campground with deer and turkeys all around the property driving
the dogs crazy throughout the day.
This guy was showing off for the ladies
So what are we looking for in the perfect piece
of property? Numbers 1, 2 and 3 on our list are a view, wildlife and being
remote. Of course price also plays a key role. There are plenty of beautiful
places if you have a couple of million. Our budget is WELL below that. Ideally
we would like the property to border National Forest lands but that is not a
deal breaker. Water and power is also a consideration. In many areas of the
Black Hills the water is just too deep to practically have a well.Some areas have rural water (~$80-120/month)
while others have no water at all and require you to truck in your own water.
Working with a realtor we narrowed our search
down to about a dozen properties in the Custer/Pringle area. Some of the pieces
were as small as 5 acres while the biggest was 80 acres. Some had huge sweeping
views while others had smaller views of valleys or pockets of forest. We
weren’t tied to one view or the other as long as we liked what we saw. We drove
by some eliminating them without getting out of the truck and eliminated more
after walking them. Finally we had narrowed down our choices to 3. The remote
80 acre piece, and a 5 acre piece bordering National Forest land and a 50 acre
piece which also bordered the National Forest. Each had their pros and cons and were unique
in their own special way.
The 80 acre piece had sweeping views and several
deep ravines. The down side it was really remote and would cost almost $20,000
to bring power in, no water and did not have the amount wildlife we were
envisioning.
View from the 80 acre piece
The 50
acre piece was about ½ open and ½ wooded. It had power right to the property
line but would require us to truck in our own water.
The wildlife in this area is incredible!
The 5 acre piece was along a road but it
bordered National Forest land and had great views as long as no one built in
front of you.
A little too close to the road for us
Our plan was to continue to walk each of these
pieces, look for building sites and get a feel for each of them. Do we see
ourselves living there?
After walking each piece on more time we decided
that the 50 acre parcel was the one for us. We would need the seller to come
down a bit to get it into our comfortable price range but we were confident
that we could get the deal done. Meeting with our realtor the next day we told
her which piece we decided on and what we would like to offer. That is when she
informed us that the seller had rejected a higher offer just a few weeks before
and did not seem willing to go much lower than their asking price!
Disappointed we did not even bother writing an
offer and headed back to our rig. With the weather forecast calling for warmer,
sunny weather we decided to move up to Ditch Creek. Although it was only 30 or
so miles what a difference! We noticed a little snow as we were driving from
Custer to Hill City and a little more from Hill City to Ditch Creek Rd. But we
were not prepared for the amount of snow we found on the road itself!
Apparently this little valley receives and retains more snow then the surrounding
area!
Once on the road you are really committed as the
first place to turn around is 4 miles down the road at the campground itself.
The road was slick and sloppy requiring us to put both vehicles into 4WD. Even
with that we slipped a little going up a few hills. Luckily we made it to the
campground without running into any other traffic.
It was apparent that no one had been to the
campground in quite a while and after a little slipping and sliding we got the
rig parked into our favorite site.
Ditch Creek is a beautiful campground right
along one of our favorite trout creeks. Usually $15/night the campground is
free during the off season. 047 Over the next couple of days the snow had
melted but then late the following afternoon it started to rain, eventually
turned to snow and we woke up to over 7” covering the area!
Snow on our favorite little trout creek
I created this video of our drive in and parking
the rig but what you will really want to see is me crashing the drone into a
tree. As I was flying it, I was not paying attention and crashed it right into
a tree! It took me a while to find it but luckily the drone survived without
damage and is ready to fly again. The crash is on the tail end of the video
below……
Down, but not out we continued to drive around
looking at different pieces of property. We were driving by a 45 acre piece we
had written off on a drive by during our last visit to the area when Barb said
“let’s just stop and walk it”. From the road it looks like an open arid 45
acres. We saw nothing but a prairie dog village. You could not see the entire property due to a
hill so we decided to walk it anyway. Once we got out and started walking it we
discovered that it has a 20 acre wooded section you cannot see from the road.
Not only that there were beautiful views, a small valley in the pockets of the
trees, and we saw deer and signs of turkey in the area. After our initial walk
we liked this piece even better than the 50 acre parcel!
The following day we walked the 45 acres with
our realtor and her husband to make sure where we thought the boundaries were
were indeed the boundaries. After they left we walked it again and stood in
several areas that we thought might make great house sites. We also marked each
of the survey markers with our GPS. When we got back to the truck we entered
them into Google Earth to get an idea of how the property laid out with the
surrounding area.
So much goes into making a decision like
this…excitement, doubt, fear….do we want to settle down here eventually? Do we
want to spend this much money? Is this the right place? Without any hesitation
we said yes to each of those questions and the next day we wrote up an offer.
We were not expecting the seller to accept that offer and of course they didn’t
but after a little back and forth they accepted our offer and we are set to
close in less than two weeks!
Overview of the property
View from our house location
Some other random shots......
We are very excited about this new adventure,
having a home base, having a place for friends to stay over when in the area
and thinking about when and what to build over the next couple of years. More
to come on that in the future……..
