Hand-tended

It has been unusually warm in the Basin during the last few days and we have been scrambling to get water to our corn crop. Much like kiddos who need attentive care during their formative years, corn needs water at specific times to minimize stress and maximize production.

I’m not a crop scientist. I just know that well irrigated corn is happy corn.

Much of our farm is still furrow irrigated. (See: old school) So, we plant corn in neat, tidy rows like all commodity growers do but our planter has the addition of “ditchers” that cut furrows into the soil for irrigation water to flow through. The furrows are approximately 18 inches wide. When the time comes, we set about “counting out” fields into eight-row “sets” for irrigating.

Each set gets its own siphon tube or hose (depending upon the field) to direct water down the aforementioned furrows/ditches for approximately 12 hours at a time.

Here comes the “hand-tended” part. We have to manually move each siphon tube or hose — by hand — every 12 hours until every ditch has received water. In addition to moving the tube or hose, we must extend some ditches, again, by hand, because the ditch does not reach the water source.

I will do a separate post about the deep, abiding love we have for our shovels. But, for now, I will say shovels become one part essential implement to help us extend ditches to water by hand; one part ditch repair mechanism (we are talking about running water in dry soil for 12 hours at a time); and one part walking stick/balancing tool.

This time of year is grueling. We have spent an average of 2 hours and 15 minutes “changing water” in the morning and an additional 2 hours and 15 minutes “changing water” in the evening every day for the last two weeks without a day off.

Why? Because our corn crop needs us. And because the people who rely upon us to raise an abundant corn crop need us too.