This post is rather late, but better late than never, right?
Hi, I’m Grant, and this is my first post. You have probably seen pictures of me shoveling the barn out in Abriana’s previous posts.
Well, now to the story. On Saturday, May 20th, we started the day out with a hearty breakfast, and then went into town to get some supplies that will be needed for the upcoming day. After we got home we started with getting the irrigation for the blueberries ready to be used. After that, I started to get lunch ready (my mother and sisters were at a conference in Illinois). After we had finished lunch we went outside and finished up some loose ends. After completing that, we decided to plow up the new asparagus patch. So, I went and got my granddad’s tractor, drove it down to our barn, and then attached the plow to the tractor. I will here tell a little about the plow.
The plow is John Deer and about 100 years old. It is one bottom and originally drawn by a horse. I am the 5th generation to use the plow. They (my grandfathers) used to plow around 60 acres with it every year! To put that into perspective, our farm has a total of 27 acres, and we’ve only plowed 1/8 of an acre on the asparagus patch. We were worn out! So then, 60 acres was a lot of plowing!!! They could plow around 3 acres a day. Now it takes only about a one 12 hour day to do 60 acres… Makes me thankful for technology!! We now get around 40 bushels of beans to the acre compared to in 1965 when my grandad got an average of 15 bushels to the acre!
Plowing is more difficult than it looks, I found that out when I offered to let my dad drive the tractor and I myself plow for a little bit. It was very hard! You have to keep the row straight and if you want to do that you have to lean to the right to turn left and to the left to turn right!
So needless to say, we dropped into bed that night exhausted and ready to go to sleep. It was a great privilege to follow in the footsteps of my great grandfathers, to hold the plow where they held it with their hands, sweating and blistering in the heat. It’s quite an experience!!!
