Maize and Rotational Crops

farmerjo · March 16, 2016

Could any sugar cane farmers please tell me how the drought is affecting your crop this year?

Has this year's (2015/16) main harvest and crush started? I heard the total tonnage is down? What about the sugar content?

Thank you!

Hi,

I don't grow sugar anymore but it is around me as far the eye can see.

Around here it was a normal average year(anywhere from 8-14 ton depending on the grower) with most farmers giving a water and fertilizer after harvest then it's on its own..

I haven't heard any ccs values but it usually peaks in febuary.The sugar factories have been open since december and normally run till april..

farmerjo · March 16, 2016

Things have been slow here, The sugar cane is still being harvested very slowly, all by hand. The migrant workers from Cambodia didn't show again this year so most of it is being cut by locals and migrants from Issan. Most is being harvested without burning. I have no idea what the current price is as I have been busy arranging the transport of my next JD6620 Combine and corn head which is currently enjoying a cruise across the Pacific. It's due to arrive in Bangkok on 1 April, an appropriate day, and then the real fun begins!

CLAAS came with their roadshow yesterday and set it up on the new corn drying area at the coop. They let the locals play with the tractors and some implements that thy brought all afternoon in a just harvested corn field. They then followed it up with a Thai style dinner which was very good. It was the first time that I have seen any CLAAS tractors. They are really good quality. They only brought one small combine, actually made in Bangalore India, a CROP TIGER 30 TERRA TRAC. They said that they would be coming to Issan somewhere in the September - October time-frame. All in all, it was a quality afternoon and evening spent. They put on a good presentation and IMHO they produce quality equipment. CLAAS put on a CLASS act! Some pictures are attached.

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Hi wayned.

Class had some of they tractors at the annual Thai dairy show last year I will agree they look a very good tractor ,one I looked at a 57 HP 4 cylinder turbo engine and was fitted with hydraulic spool valves as standerd , not that Thailand uses hydraulics like the Europeans ,but still a good ider .

The guy selling the tractors told me the price ,which I can not remember ,but at the time they were more expencive than the equialant Kubota tractors ,more's the pity .

Class brought Renault Agriculture to expand its product range with tractors .mainly then 90HP + tractors, which Renault then manufactured ,I would say the smaller range of tractors built now would be they own design ,(not like the Yanmar/ JD partnership of small JD tractors).where they are made I do not know ,I thought Europe ,but on what you wrote about combines who knows .

I think in Thailand they are based in Ayutthaya Provence .

I liked the harvester,nice sturdy construction and a better track system than the Kubota's.The price was 500000 more than the DC-70G but was a bigger model as well with handling capacity.The only reason i steered away from it in the end was the thrashing assembly runs east/west so not as maintenance friendly.Everything else was fine.

3ThaiKids · March 16, 2016

Looking for source of high quality field corn (dent corn) to use in making tortillas. Any high starch variety works but if some one is growing a Mexican or NA variety that would be even better. Ready to purchase today. Need several large bags of corn to perfect the nixtalamization process then need steady source.

farmerjo · March 16, 2016

Looking for source of high quality field corn (dent corn) to use in making tortillas. Any high starch variety works but if some one is growing a Mexican or NA variety that would be even better. Ready to purchase today. Need several large bags of corn to perfect the nixtalamization process then need steady source.

Most of us just grow feed hybrid varieties.

Try as well in the chiang mai forum as the growers there do a bit of organic farming which may have the seeds your after.

Also do a search in the western food section as i read a while a go some guys talking about the same thing.

farmerjo · March 16, 2016

Finished the mods to the harvester for the sunn hemp.

1 lowered broad elevator chain setting.

2 replaced 15mm screen with 7mm aperture screen.

3 replaced the 6 rotor spike arms back to orginal(corn back to rice)

Then took a sample to see how it looks.

Not to bad but still a long way off mature stage yet.

farmerjo · March 19, 2016

Sad day on the farm today,been fighting fires all day,

Managed to save sunn hemp field and house and shed but to late for the back 75 rai.

2 years of ground cover lost which will cause erosion problems.

Does anyone know if i've also lost the gypsum i applied???

The fire started about 1 km away,people will never learn,a scorching hot week of weather and strong winds.

As usual nobody saw it start except me which counts for nothing.I would like thank my neighbours who helped all day.

loong · March 19, 2016

Sorry FarmerJoe,

I am convinced that there is a pyromaniac gene in the Thai DNA. They make fires for absolutely no reason.

In this village there are 4 people who make them low table thingies, so a lot of the locals are employed in preparing the bamboo. They get a lot of bamboo shavings which they burn as well as all the dry weeds. What gets me is that they burn these shavings for no reason and then use old inner tubes to light their cooking fires, The shavings light easily and don't stink up and pollute the atmosphere.

farmerjo · March 19, 2016

Sorry FarmerJoe,

I am convinced that there is a pyromaniac gene in the Thai DNA. They make fires for absolutely no reason.

In this village there are 4 people who make them low table thingies, so a lot of the locals are employed in preparing the bamboo. They get a lot of bamboo shavings which they burn as well as all the dry weeds. What gets me is that they burn these shavings for no reason and then use old inner tubes to light their cooking fires, The shavings light easily and don't stink up and pollute the atmosphere.

Thanks loong,

Will be up for a while tonight watching for spot fires to help my neighbours out.

I've always worried about these contractors who come in and burn peoples sugar on contract,rip,tear and bust the locals.

kickstart · March 19, 2016

Hi Jo

Sorry about your loses ,we have had sugar cane fires get out of control ,and burnt a neibuours sugar cane, ,round here the culprit has to pay ,some form of compensation ,have a word with your Po-Yai- Bann , and maybe ,a big maybe. you might get a few baht , and no I am not in to all this ''compensation culture'' BS, making a noise about it has got to be better than what some Thai's would do , shrug of the shoulders and say Mie Pen Rie.

The wifes daughter and son in law cut sugar cane ,and often they will burn the cane the night before they cut it, so for them if it gets out of control they have probably done them self's out of a job, an incentive to do the job right .

As for the gypsum I have seen these type fires before, and as you said they was a strong wind ,and the fire makes its own wind to ,if it travelled quickly might not have done any harm to the gypsum .

After all gypsum is mineral ,and found in rock formations.

Good luck mate .

farmerjo · March 20, 2016

Hi Jo

Sorry about your loses ,we have had sugar cane fires get out of control ,and burnt a neibuours sugar cane, ,round here the culprit has to pay ,some form of compensation ,have a word with your Po-Yai- Bann , and maybe ,a big maybe. you might get a few baht , and no I am not in to all this ''compensation culture'' BS, making a noise about it has got to be better than what some Thai's would do , shrug of the shoulders and say Mie Pen Rie.

The wifes daughter and son in law cut sugar cane ,and often they will burn the cane the night before they cut it, so for them if it gets out of control they have probably done them self's out of a job, an incentive to do the job right .

As for the gypsum I have seen these type fires before, and as you said they was a strong wind ,and the fire makes its own wind to ,if it travelled quickly might not have done any harm to the gypsum .

After all gypsum is mineral ,and found in rock formations.

Good luck mate .

Hi KS,

Yes i agree,i'm not into the compensation thing either as financially i can pull through.The Thai's are different,a young guy had to pay 160,000 for damage he caused not long ago.Although i do think everyone should be made to have firebreaks,regardless of size

of land.If they were in place the fire would have stopped at the source and not been able to build up a front.If that can't be done at least have a register of when and where people are burning to make them accountable.That's the 2nd time in 12 years i've been burnt out.I'm very happy

i'm not a tree or livestock farmer at these times.

Having a look around this morning,have about 1km of fencing to replace the posts.And have a couple of big old trees smouldering away

which will have to keep an eye on for a few days.So if i've retained the gypsum on the land i'm content.However the wife is a different story

with all the ash blowing into the house and yard.

Allgeier · March 22, 2016

Sorry to read this with the burning. Many work for nothing. But maybe we can learn somethink from this and be prepared in the future if it's happen again. And it's will be happen.

farmerjo · March 28, 2016

Harvest time.

farmerjo · March 28, 2016

The above was done this afternoon and below this morning.

Edited March 28, 2016 by farmerjo

kickstart · March 28, 2016

Hi FJ

Sun hemp seed looks ok a bit of rubish ,but can not be easy to get the right settings for the combine ,I do not supose the combine instrution book has setings for sun hemp , do you think that any went over the back of the combine ?

Any Idea as to the yield /rie? and the moisture content ,where we are in Lopburi the daily temperature is getting up 40c now I would have thought it would be 15 -18%?.

Any ides how you are going to incorporate straw in to the land , can not see it doing any good sat on the surface.

An interesting exercise, have a soil sample from that field taken and send it to a lab see what the results are , I know that one swallow does not make a summer ,and the gypsum will not be all incorporated, and the one crop being a legume , would it make a difference ,if only a small one ,and looking at the ordinal test results ,soil short of everything ,one crop might have done something ,could be a guide to future cropping .

farmerjo · March 28, 2016

Hi FJ

Sun hemp seed looks ok a bit of rubish ,but can not be easy to get the right settings for the combine ,I do not supose the combine instrution book has setings for sun hemp , do you think that any went over the back of the combine ?

Any Idea as to the yield /rie? and the moisture content ,where we are in Lopburi the daily temperature is getting up 40c now I would have thought it would be 15 -18%?.

Any ides how you are going to incorporate straw in to the land , can not see it doing any good sat on the surface.

An interesting exercise, have a soil sample from that field taken and send it to a lab see what the results are , I know that one swallow does not make a summer ,and the gypsum will not be all incorporated, and the one crop being a legume , would it make a difference ,if only a small one ,and looking at the ordinal test results ,soil short of everything ,one crop might have done something ,could be a guide to future cropping .

Hi KS,

The first thing i will say is it's up there with oats and some barleys for itchiness,was more than happy to finish and have a shower.

The machine settings were trial and error,there was more trash in the morning sample which is understandable with moisture being higher and harder to thrash.There were a few seeds coming out the back,i could have made a fan(wind speed)adjustment but felt the sample would of been worse so left it alone.The seive is also adjustable but as it wasn't a thick crop i left it pretty open so it could recirculate back through the system.It took a while to figure out the right speed of travel to get it to feed into the comb properly,still had to stop ocassionally with green stalks getting jammed in the knife.

The timing of harvest was a trade off as i've got to go away next week and the amount of damage the insects were doing.It was 110 days,120 would have been better under the right circumstances.

I haven't done a moisture check yet,and the yield(roughly 25kg/rai) was enough seed to plant out on back land which was the goal as well as learning more about it.

The straw broke down extremely well after going through the harvester so will leave it on top and hope few critters will incorporate it.Thinking about

another subsoil pass on that land(a little deeper) before next crop if it stays dry.

With regards to the soil sample i will save my money as visually i can see it still needs a few heavy residue rotation crops to make a difference.

The good thing to come out of this is the improved weed control,none have been able to get established and set seed and that's a win for no-till

planting in the future.

Edited March 28, 2016 by farmerjo

kickstart · March 28, 2016

Hi FJ

Sun hemp seed looks ok a bit of rubish ,but can not be easy to get the right settings for the combine ,I do not supose the combine instrution book has setings for sun hemp , do you think that any went over the back of the combine ?

Any Idea as to the yield /rie? and the moisture content ,where we are in Lopburi the daily temperature is getting up 40c now I would have thought it would be 15 -18%?.

Any ides how you are going to incorporate straw in to the land , can not see it doing any good sat on the surface.

An interesting exercise, have a soil sample from that field taken and send it to a lab see what the results are , I know that one swallow does not make a summer ,and the gypsum will not be all incorporated, and the one crop being a legume , would it make a difference ,if only a small one ,and looking at the ordinal test results ,soil short of everything ,one crop might have done something ,could be a guide to future cropping .

Hi KS,

The first thing i will say is it's up there with oats and some barleys for itchiness,was more than happy to finish and have a shower.

The machine settings were trial and error,there was more trash in the morning sample which is understandable with moisture being higher and harder to thrash.There were a few seeds coming out the back,i could have made a fan(wind speed)adjustment but felt the sample would of been worse so left it alone.The seive is also adjustable but as it wasn't a thick crop i left it pretty open so it could recirculate back through the system.It took a while to figure out the right speed of travel to get it to feed into the comb properly,still had to stop ocassionally with green stalks getting jammed in the knife.

The timing of harvest was a trade off as i've got to go away next week and the amount of damage the insects were doing.It was 110 days,120 would have been better under the right circumstances.

I haven't done a moisture check yet,and the yield(roughly 25kg/rai) was enough seed to plant out on back land which was the goal as well as learning more about it.

The straw broke down extremely well after going through the harvester so will leave it on top and hope few critters will incorporate it.Thinking about

another subsoil pass on that land(a little deeper) before next crop if it stays dry.

With regards to the soil sample i will save my money as visually i can see it still needs a few heavy residue rotation crops to make a difference.

The good thing to come out of this is the improved weed control,none have been able to get established and set seed and that's a win for no-till

planting in the future.

Hi FJ

You said before about weed control ,which I forgot ,and after some of those photos you posted last year of 6 foot high rice grass . if the sun hemp can help that problem a very large bonus.

As you said that has to be a big plus no-till , if it can help cut down on spray costs another bonus.

Michael Hare · March 29, 2016

Hi FJ

Sun hemp seed looks ok a bit of rubish ,but can not be easy to get the right settings for the combine ,I do not supose the combine instrution book has setings for sun hemp , do you think that any went over the back of the combine ?

Any Idea as to the yield /rie? and the moisture content ,where we are in Lopburi the daily temperature is getting up 40c now I would have thought it would be 15 -18%?.

Any ides how you are going to incorporate straw in to the land , can not see it doing any good sat on the surface.

An interesting exercise, have a soil sample from that field taken and send it to a lab see what the results are , I know that one swallow does not make a summer ,and the gypsum will not be all incorporated, and the one crop being a legume , would it make a difference ,if only a small one ,and looking at the ordinal test results ,soil short of everything ,one crop might have done something ,could be a guide to future cropping .

Hi KS,

The first thing i will say is it's up there with oats and some barleys for itchiness,was more than happy to finish and have a shower.

The machine settings were trial and error,there was more trash in the morning sample which is understandable with moisture being higher and harder to thrash.There were a few seeds coming out the back,i could have made a fan(wind speed)adjustment but felt the sample would of been worse so left it alone.The seive is also adjustable but as it wasn't a thick crop i left it pretty open so it could recirculate back through the system.It took a while to figure out the right speed of travel to get it to feed into the comb properly,still had to stop ocassionally with green stalks getting jammed in the knife.

The timing of harvest was a trade off as i've got to go away next week and the amount of damage the insects were doing.It was 110 days,120 would have been better under the right circumstances.

I haven't done a moisture check yet,and the yield(roughly 25kg/rai) was enough seed to plant out on back land which was the goal as well as learning more about it.

The straw broke down extremely well after going through the harvester so will leave it on top and hope few critters will incorporate it.Thinking about

another subsoil pass on that land(a little deeper) before next crop if it stays dry.

With regards to the soil sample i will save my money as visually i can see it still needs a few heavy residue rotation crops to make a difference.

The good thing to come out of this is the improved weed control,none have been able to get established and set seed and that's a win for no-till

planting in the future.

25 kg/rai is fairly low, but given the long dry season may be indication of lack of soil moisture. My sunnhemp seed contract farmers are getting a range of yields. Yesterday one farmer brought in 170 kg from off one rai. Another farmer produced 277 kg from 6 rai (46 kg/rai). In other areas the yields are ranging from 20 kg/rai up to 150 kg/rai. The best yields are from fields planted immediately after rice harvest in mid-November when there was still a lot of residual moisture in the soil.

A sure but slow way to clean the seed is to soak it in tubs of water. The light straw, broken pods and broken seed float to the top of the water. Skim that off and then dry the heavy, clean seed in the sun for a few hours. Using this method you can get 99% purity.

Allgeier · March 29, 2016

If i plant corn only with chicken or pig poo. How many Kilo i should put on one sqm/Rai?

If i let come a kubota riceharvester to harvest my sunn hemp and there not change somethink insite the maschine. Its work or not? Or all the seed will go away?

Because for sure there will not change somethink for 1 Rai of sunnhemp.

farmerjo · March 29, 2016

Hi FJ

Sun hemp seed looks ok a bit of rubish ,but can not be easy to get the right settings for the combine ,I do not supose the combine instrution book has setings for sun hemp , do you think that any went over the back of the combine ?

Any Idea as to the yield /rie? and the moisture content ,where we are in Lopburi the daily temperature is getting up 40c now I would have thought it would be 15 -18%?.

Any ides how you are going to incorporate straw in to the land , can not see it doing any good sat on the surface.

An interesting exercise, have a soil sample from that field taken and send it to a lab see what the results are , I know that one swallow does not make a summer ,and the gypsum will not be all incorporated, and the one crop being a legume , would it make a difference ,if only a small one ,and looking at the ordinal test results ,soil short of everything ,one crop might have done something ,could be a guide to future cropping .

Hi KS,

The first thing i will say is it's up there with oats and some barleys for itchiness,was more than happy to finish and have a shower.

The machine settings were trial and error,there was more trash in the morning sample which is understandable with moisture being higher and harder to thrash.There were a few seeds coming out the back,i could have made a fan(wind speed)adjustment but felt the sample would of been worse so left it alone.The seive is also adjustable but as it wasn't a thick crop i left it pretty open so it could recirculate back through the system.It took a while to figure out the right speed of travel to get it to feed into the comb properly,still had to stop ocassionally with green stalks getting jammed in the knife.

The timing of harvest was a trade off as i've got to go away next week and the amount of damage the insects were doing.It was 110 days,120 would have been better under the right circumstances.

I haven't done a moisture check yet,and the yield(roughly 25kg/rai) was enough seed to plant out on back land which was the goal as well as learning more about it.

The straw broke down extremely well after going through the harvester so will leave it on top and hope few critters will incorporate it.Thinking about

another subsoil pass on that land(a little deeper) before next crop if it stays dry.

With regards to the soil sample i will save my money as visually i can see it still needs a few heavy residue rotation crops to make a difference.

The good thing to come out of this is the improved weed control,none have been able to get established and set seed and that's a win for no-till

planting in the future.

25 kg/rai is fairly low, but given the long dry season may be indication of lack of soil moisture. My sunnhemp seed contract farmers are getting a range of yields. Yesterday one farmer brought in 170 kg from off one rai. Another farmer produced 277 kg from 6 rai (46 kg/rai). In other areas the yields are ranging from 20 kg/rai up to 150 kg/rai. The best yields are from fields planted immediately after rice harvest in mid-November when there was still a lot of residual moisture in the soil.

A sure but slow way to clean the seed is to soak it in tubs of water. The light straw, broken pods and broken seed float to the top of the water. Skim that off and then dry the heavy, clean seed in the sun for a few hours. Using this method you can get 99% purity.

Hi Michael,

I sowed at 1.2 kg/rai which is very light with non graded seed and i reakon 75 percent loss of yield was from moths and larvae.

If i increase seeding rates and control the insects i could see better results instantly.

Will do a germination test in a few days time.

farmerjo · March 29, 2016

If i plant corn only with chicken or pig poo. How many Kilo i should put on one sqm/Rai?

If i let come a kubota riceharvester to harvest my sunn hemp and there not change somethink insite the maschine. Its work or not? Or all the seed will go away?

Because for sure there will not change somethink for 1 Rai of sunnhemp.

Hi Allgeier,

Don't know about your fertilizer as i only use mineral types.

With regards to a standard setup for rice harvester to harvest sunn hemp i would say it will do it.

The only difference is you will have more trash in your sample.

The changes to mine was a smaller screen from 15mm down to 7mm and concave angle bars from 27 degrees to 10 degtees.

I also left the long fingers on the comb which are used for corn to prevent feeding in loss.

Otherwise all other adjustments are available on the harvester if required.

kickstart · March 30, 2016

Hi Allgeier

If you Google pig or poultry manure they should be the information you need ,it does tell you the NPK of all the main manures on a kg basics ,you should be able to work it out ,working back from the requiments of NPK of chemical fertilizers .

BSJ · April 3, 2016

So it's Sun Hemp the wife grew a while back! She said it was black sesame seeds!

On the first the harvester came for the corn. They took off a tidge over 4 tonne. To dry they said. Gave her 5200baht/tonne. Seems like a waste of time growing it for that!

kickstart · April 3, 2016

HI BSJ

5.20 Baht/kg not a lot .the cost of irrigating will have taken away most of the profit .the problem of growing maize in the dry season ,the need to irrigate the crop ,we did grow some sweet corn a few years ago ,during the dry season ,some we sold already cooked some we sold raw for others to cook . all sold locally

We did not make that much profit ,but more than if we grew maize for selling the corn .

If you have some labour to help ie family , could be a way of selling maize .our neighbour was selling sweetcorn up to last month cooking it at our local market, selling sweet corn at 20 Baht/Kg ,he was buying raw corn at 8-10 Baht/Kg , from a grower , both yellow ,and the white corn.

wayned · April 4, 2016

My next JD 6620 is due to arrive at 0800 tomorrow so this is what tomorrow morning will look like:

Due to the drought many locals are drilling wells and growing small plots of sweet corn. I'm not sure what price they are getting,

but when it's ready a crew and truck comes and picks the entire field. I'm sure that they never calculated how long it will take to get any ROI,

for the cost of sinking the well and pumping the water.

Having said that any ROI on the new beast is far off especially if the weather continues without rain. I walked the orchard yesterday and counted another 16 dead mango trees. I only have been trying to water the ones near the house along with the Thai lemon trees but I think that I am fighting a loosing battle!

BSJ · April 6, 2016

My next JD 6620 is due to arrive at 0800 tomorrow so this is what tomorrow morning will look like:

DSC00886.JPG

Due to the drought many locals are drilling wells and growing small plots of sweet corn. I'm not sure what price they are getting,

but when it's ready a crew and truck comes and picks the entire field. I'm sure that they never calculated how long it will take to get any ROI,

for the cost of sinking the well and pumping the water.

Having said that any ROI on the new beast is far off especially if the weather continues without rain. I walked the orchard yesterday and counted another 16 dead mango trees. I only have been trying to water the ones near the house along with the Thai lemon trees but I think that I am fighting a loosing battle!

I watered all the mature trees a few weeks ago. Even the crappy trees are holding up as are last years replacements. The 6 months old trees are not doing so well, we have been watering them weekly but for no reason I can see....some die. Of the 40 we planted 15 are dead.

I think we got enough water for 2 more times....but it's a shitty job sitting out in the heat of the day watering the trees with a 1" hose!

farmerjo · April 27, 2016

Finally back in LOS after some time away.

To be honest even with rain events 7mm,9mm and 2mm since i've been away it still looks ok.

Weeds will need spraying out when a decent down pour happens but there not out of control.

So i should be able to get away with a chemical knockdown then plant some more sunn hemp before the end of may.

Everything else seems slow(sugar),cassava seems to be the crop of choice this year.

Things must be slow,had 4 guys from Kubota turn up today and will come back next week to do an oil change on harvester(it's done 42 hours)

Asked them to grease the machine as well and the response was how much grease do you want to buy and do you have a grease gun,because we don't carry one for services lol.

But it's good to be back ,

kickstart · April 27, 2016

Hi FJ

When you got off the airplane at swampy ,are you sure it was the LOS ,of all the year's I have been in Lopburi , this has to be the driest and the hottest ,we had a shower of rain end of February, then nothing only sun and more sun ,nothing is growing, some irrigated sugar is not looking to bad , but at what cost ,some sugar growers only got 750- 800 Baht/ton ,a lot is being ploughed out , I would say a lot can not afford the cost of replanting ,what money they have got/made is going towards boreholes and small reservoirs , about the only people ,making money now are the owners of 360 back hoe's ,and owner/drivers of sip-laws. there will be more maize this year , if we get any rain.

Why don't you take the box bit off your box scraper and just use the tines like a cultivator ,one or two passes with that ,will lift the soil ,and the weeds ,and the sun will do the rest, dry out the weeds ,I have done that myself, it does work , and when you drill the crop ,use a pre-emergent spray .

I was back in the uk last month ,for a few weeks ,I read in the farming press direct drilling is making a come back after 20+ years? farmers are looking at ways to cut costs and direct drilling seems to fit the bill ,in an autumn sown crop how they solved the slug problem I do not know ,must be some new techknowledge out they .

I bought myself a rain gauge ,so I hope it will get used ,or will it cancel the rainy season .

PS Welcome back.

wayned · April 27, 2016

The only good a rain gauge would be around here is a measuring device to use while cooking. I think we got the last drip of the shower that you had in February, everything is drying. There's a migrant crew going around boring holes in the ground and putting in 6" casings and capping them. Most of the farmer's don't have the money to finish the wells - pumps, sheds and power source since there's no electric.

The local "toads" have taken up residence in the dog's water bowl in the back yard. We haven't begun assembly of the last combine that I imported as it isn't a priority since nothing's being planted to harvest, but we are extending the enclosure to provide more shade to store the parts until the rebuild begins The water situation is really bleak but for some reason the local water supply has not gone dry this year although at times it's a trickle. In the past years it would dry up in March/April and not start again until rainy season..

farmerjo · April 28, 2016

Hi FJ

When you got off the airplane at swampy ,are you sure it was the LOS ,of all the year's I have been in Lopburi , this has to be the driest and the hottest ,we had a shower of rain end of February, then nothing only sun and more sun ,nothing is growing, some irrigated sugar is not looking to bad , but at what cost ,some sugar growers only got 750- 800 Baht/ton ,a lot is being ploughed out , I would say a lot can not afford the cost of replanting ,what money they have got/made is going towards boreholes and small reservoirs , about the only people ,making money now are the owners of 360 back hoe's ,and owner/drivers of sip-laws. there will be more maize this year , if we get any rain.

Why don't you take the box bit off your box scraper and just use the tines like a cultivator ,one or two passes with that ,will lift the soil ,and the weeds ,and the sun will do the rest, dry out the weeds ,I have done that myself, it does work , and when you drill the crop ,use a pre-emergent spray .

I was back in the uk last month ,for a few weeks ,I read in the farming press direct drilling is making a come back after 20+ years? farmers are looking at ways to cut costs and direct drilling seems to fit the bill ,in an autumn sown crop how they solved the slug problem I do not know ,must be some new techknowledge out they .

I bought myself a rain gauge ,so I hope it will get used ,or will it cancel the rainy season .

PS Welcome back.

Hi KS,

Hope you fill that rain guage many times over mate.

The skies up this way are not normal,you wouldn't see a thunderstorm coming.Just dense air,never seen it like this before for so long.

My stay is only for 3-4 weeks but will work with my program to plant sunn hemp and when i return knock it down and seed corn.

I've got to get out and repair a few bog marks from last year,with the box scraper it doesn't disassemble but i can use a shorter top linkage which should give enough clearance between the tynes and back blade to let trash pass and sort of work as a scarifier.

@ Wayned,get the harvester together,i have a feeling a lot of corn will be planted this year,farmers will suffer with a market glut but should work for contractors and help livestock feed prices.

wayned · April 29, 2016

Well, it finally rained yesterday afternoon, about 1.5 cm but at a cost. The rain came along with wind and it was a horizontal rainfall. The tents set up for the funeral across the street ended up in the field down the street. I had to stuff towels under the back door to keep the water from blowing in, it was a real mess. Funny the the portion of the tree that was not cut down and hangs over the power lines is still intact, but the electric was off for over 9 hours prompting a successful search for a generator to power the "coffin" refrigerator.

The most damage was done to our new weigh station. The roof is totally gone blown intact against a house about 250 meters away which also lost part of its roof. Our new steel structure is intact but the old storage facility also lost its roof. The two families that had taken up residence in the rooms attached to the weigh station are now homeless again and everything inside had extensive water damage.

I think that the main reason for the loss of the roof was poor construction techniques. The roof structure was made of wood, not steel, and nailed not screwed. Pilot holes for the 3/16" nails were drilled using a 1/8" drill for ease of construction and to prevent cracking of the substandard lumber. Not my idea as I am a "screw" type guy with wood. The whole roof structure is intact still secured to the cross members. Once a part of the structure became detached the whole thing became a giant sail. The joys of Thai construction.