Harvesting the Corn

(click on picture)

During the last full moon in October the neighbors corn field was harvested.  When I came home from work that evening we could hear the hum of the combine harvesting the corn.  Kiefer and I walked over to the corn field and were amazed at all the action we had found.  We watched in awe as one of the largest combines (twelve row harvest head, sixteen is the biggest) burrowed through the field and harvest the corn like a giant lawn mower.  There were multiple tractors and trucks pulling around corn wagons and passing along the golden harvested kernels from combine to cart through dinosaur head like chutes.  Kiefer and I watched the operation for about an hour and even witnessed the full moon rise in front of us as the sun hid behind the trees.  We finally called in quits and began to walk home as it was getting dark and we still had not eaten dinner.  As we waved to some farmers driving the tractors past us the combine stopped so the driver could pickup his bagged fast food dinner from another helper.  Then came the words we weren't expecting.  The combine driver yelled over to us "hey, do you want to ride?"   I looked up at Kiefer sitting on my shoulders and asked him if he wanted to ride, and he replied his standard answer, Yesch...

Although we only rode four laps around the field we witnessed hundreds if not thousands of corn plants be stripped into simple kernels.  The view was spectacular with a dozen or so lights lighting the field around us and strobe lights flashing signaling the tractors to drive close by and get ready to transfer the corn from our chute.  Kiefer sat on my lap of a very spacious, quite and smooth riding monster machine and looked around at the computer screen, video monitor of the corn falling into the hopper and the translucent rear window rapidly darkening as the corn filled up the bin.   It was an experience that we both will remember for a long time. The farmers worked late into teh night and stripped the field clean.  The next day was a rainy day so no harvesting would happen.  Lucky for us! the farmers left some of their machines behind for us to explorer!