He Went To Denver For A Stripper

A "stripper" header is what Todd, the custom cutter guy, that I blog about on my Puffman Blog. Tall Todd was only down in the Conrad area for a couple of weeks, arriving a little late from Denver rains holding up the winter wheat harvest along with the early harvest here in our Golden Triangle. After a short stint in Montana, Todd moved up to Alberta & then moved on to Saskatchewan, because the grain (barley contracted to Busch & Malt Euro in Montana) wasn't ripe in Alberta. He went back to Denver to pick up a "stripper" header for harvesting peas in Alberta. Todd reports that the stripper header works great in the peas & leaves quite a bit of stubble. He cut around 1000 acres of peas, which averaged around 60 bushels. Todd spent 10 days up in Saskatchewan, saying there was "some" evidence of smoke from the forest fires to the west. Returning to Alberta, he found that the grain had ripened very little, thinking perhaps the smoky, cloudy skies had something to do with the slow ripening. According to Todd, the BEST winter wheat crop was in the Denver area & the BEST barley was in the Montana & Alberta area while he thinks the BEST spring wheat will be in the Alberta area. He submits that from Lethbridge to the south is mostly harvested, but north of Lethbridge still has a lot to be harvested, while in the Calgary area, they're just beginning to swath. The recent rains we've had in Montana have also moved north, with similar amounts, so harvest is at a standstill until dry, warm weather blows in. As for the fuel prices in Canada...they haven't dropped with diesel being around a dollar a liter! Todd is contemplating going south for the fall harvest of corns & beans & says the high moisture harvest is just beginning in Kansas. He also anticipates that there will be work in northern Alberta sometime this fall as their crops were slower maturing than in the southern part of the province. And so it goes in the world of custom harvesting. Good work, boys!