Walnuts

The walnuts are doing nicely. 3 of the 5 trees seem to have thicker foliage and more nuts on them. We should be harvesting them in late September or early October. Then we'll have a shelling party!

Sunflower progress

 

The sunflowers are growing so fast! They are almost 5 1/2 feet now. Some of them are starting to show flower buds. We abandoned the idea of putting netting up over them. When we sat down and thought about it we realized just how difficult it would be. A friend recommended using reflective streamers on poles to deter birds. We still have a little time before we need anti-bird countermeasures in place!

Pinto bean progress

The pinto beans are doing even worse than the yelloweye beans, unfortunately. They are almost all very tiny, and have slug damage as well. We are not sure we will be able to take a crop of pinto beans off the field at all. Again, the late planting, lack of water, and low pH are all negatively affecting the beans. The weeds are a problem. Yet another case for acquiring a tine cultivator for next season.

Yelloweye bean progress

The yelloweye beans are doing fairly poorly. We would have like to plant them at least 4-6 weeks earlier, but were unable to get on the fields due to muddy conditions. They almost all look small and underdeveloped. The few spots where they look okay are clusters of plants. They seem to do better when planted closer. The planter we used made it very difficult to control planting rates. We would have liked to plant at around double the seeding rate we used, which was 40-50 pounds per acre. This field would also have benefited from tine cultivation. The weeds are pretty bad in much of the field, with annual ryegrass as the main problem.

"Naked" oats progress

The "naked" or hull-less oats are also doing extremely well. We planted them about 2 weeks after the cayuse oats, so they are not quite as far along, but they look great. Weed pressure is almost nonexistent in both fields. We are excited about this crop as there is huge potential for naked oats.

Cayuse oats progress

The cayuse oats are doing fantastic. They came up extremely quickly. They seem to tolerate slightly more marginal ground very well. This field isn't particularly wet, but the other field we planted cayuse in is very wet, and they came up very thick. The weeds don't seem too bad at all, in fact they are almost nonexistent in both fields.

Soft white wheat progress

The soft white wheat is almost ready to harvest. In about 2 more weeks we should be threshing it. This field looks outstanding. The wheat is chest-high and very thick. The broadleaf weeds are a problem in the soft white wheat, but we have just started upgrading our cleaning facility to handle wheat very efficiently, so cleaning out the weeds after harvest shouldn't be too much of a problem.