Taylor Broderius

Taylor Broderius attends the University of Minnesota and is a Minnesota Corn Growers Association Agvocate. Taylor grew up on a farm in Hector, Minn., helping his family raise corn, soybeans, sugar beets, and peas.

Every weekend during harvest season, Taylor returns home to help with harvest. In addition to all the work Taylor puts in on the farm, he will be providing MinnesotaCornerstone.com with stories and photos on how this year’s harvest is going. This is part 2 of that ongoing series.

If you’re a farmer, it’s a great way to check out how harvest is shaping up for a fellow farmer in a different part of the state. If you’re not a farmer, Taylor’s work will hopefully give you a better understanding of all the work farmers put in during harvest season to provide, safe, healthy and affordable food for a growing world population.

Here is Taylor’s first submission:

Greasing bearings
Last Saturday, my dad and I took half a day to prepare our grain system for corn storage. This consisted of greasing bearings, running the elevator, oiling chains, and starting the dryer. This is a picture of me looking down from the top of our 80-foot elevator. When I was at the top of the elevator, I had to grease two different bearings. These two bearings need to be greased so when the elevator is running, there is no friction so the machine runs easier. If these bearings are not greased, it can cause major problems and result in broken parts.

Pulling the chisel plow
On Saturday night, I found myself sitting in one of our John Deere four-wheel drive tractors. The piece of equipment I am pulling here is called a chisel plow. I am working ground that previously had Sugar Beets grown in it. Now that the crop has been harvested, the ground needs to be worked. When pulling this piece of equipment, one travels at about 5 miles per hour. Although chisel plows can vary in size, the one you see here is 38 feet wide.

Lower yields
This picture was taken during the harvest of one of our last bean fields. Although the bean field was below par as far as bushels per acre, it was ready to be taken. The moisture of the beans were coming in anywhere from 10.5-12 percent. Once the field was taken and we got an idea of bushels per acre, we calculated that it was around 35 bushels per acre, worse then we originally thought. As a farmer, you prepare for low yields like this and hope that next year is a huge yielding crop.