Monday, March 22, 2010

"It" is....

...a large chunk of petrified wood! Here's another picture of it that shows the grain of the wood better:

Nathanael guessed it correctly and many of you were very close, and, in a way, correct when guessing a rock of some sort... Thanks once again for all the guesses!!! I very much enjoy hearing from you all and then looking at the same mystery picture and trying to see what you were seeing in it!


I looked up petrified wood on-line just now and saw that pieces this large are selling for between $200 and $500! I didn't realize that our new lawn ornament was that valuable. :)


It was a very productive day once again on the farm...


I made bread; ice cream; baked a couple cakes; made pizza; and tidied up the kitchen, again...


Mother was gone all day at class, but this was the last day, so it will be nice to have her back home again!


Dad and the boys worked on the grain-cleaner once again for most of the day... I thought I'd vaguely explain what our guys' grain-cleaners do, as I know some of you don't live on a farm and may not know what it's purpose is...


My dad (and now Andrew) will pull the trailer that has the grain-cleaner on it to a farmer's yard and will set it up by the farmer's grain-bins. Then, one auger takes the grain from the bin and delivers it into the cleaner. The cleaner then separates the large kernels of grain from the smaller ones and all the weed seeds--dumping the small kernels and weed seeds (called screenings) into another auger that takes them to the farmer's truck. The large, clean kernels go out another way--onto another of the farmers' trucks. It's a really neat process to watch, but it gets very dusty working with the grain all day and Dad and Andrew's voices usually end up being gravelly for about a month until they're done with the cleaning season.


Why does the farmer pay for their grain to be cleaned, you may ask? Well, they don't want to plant the small kernels (which may not grow) or the weed seeds (which will certainly grow into undesirable weeds)! My dad just had another call this afternoon from a farmer who has a 2-3 day long cleaning job, so the guys are really hoping to get going very soon!!!


There, now didn't you just want to know all that? :)

3 comments:

Hannah said...

YEAH FOR NATHANAEL!!! He is so much into rocks and petrified everything =D. He took one look at it and said that's petrified wood!
Wow! I did not realize that petrified wood goes for that much.
Grace, the brothers and I wanted to make icecream today too. But alas, there was no cream. Just a little bit and it was in a milk bottle and there was no way of skimming it off. So, we are going to save up some cream until we have enough!
I did not mind reading about the grain cleaner, I did not really know what it was :)!
Good night Cora!
~Hannah

Mrs. E said...

Awww... that's what it was! :)
Very neat!!

Kimberly said...

That is very interesting about the grain cleaning. When I was a young girl at home on the farm my father would have to take his grain to the elevator to be cleaned. How nice that the farmer can now have someone come in and clean his grain right on the farm!

I loved your spring pictures. I miss seeing chickens out in the yard.