Hail-Back to Beans

#farming #agriculture

Beans were finally dry enough to start, so we switched both combines from corn to soybeans. We’re starting with the two fields that got hailed. The insurance adjusters came out to look at them first, and the hailed beans have to come off before anything else because broken stems lose more every day they stand. Along the way: a cold start on our 2011 machine (and why we didn’t trade it), swapping the header from corn to beans, the last load of corn out of the yard, and a header that didn’t like sticky ground until the dealer pointed me at one adjuster nut.

Onyx on the grain cart, Dad in the other combine, Danny in the truck. 150 acres done by evening.

0:00 Morning with Anna, Dig & Larry
0:41 Today’s plan: switching to soybeans
1:21 Why we kept the 2011 combine
1:59 Cold start
3:17 Firing up the dryer
4:04 Changing the combine from corn to beans
6:52 Change of plans
7:12 Patching the driveway
8:14 Last load of corn
8:51 Hail damage & the insurance adjusters
11:33 The convoy heads out
11:58 First soybeans of 2026
13:25 Checking for losses
14:00 Sticky ground & a header fix
16:24 Back in business
17:26 150 acres done