PLANTING CORN

Planting today on the Weikel family farm is done with mechanical equipment attached to a tractor. When Mr. Weikel was very young (70 years ago), planting would have been done with a horse- drawn planter. Generations of farmers before Mr. Weikel would have used a human-powered wheel barrow-like planter for these planting operations.

The Weikel farm plants corn, wheat, soy beans, and hay in their fields. Each year they plant approximately 150 acres of crops. The crops are primarily used as feed for their animals, but delicious sweet corn will be planted today.

The photos below show how the corn is planted at the farm. The planting mechanism is attached to a tractor near the barn and prepared for work in the fields.

1. Small amounts of seed can be placed in the channel to the left. This planter has four bins that can plant four rows at a time.		2. Silver queen seed corn is put into place.
3. These bins can be used to store seed for planting larger quantities of crops.		4. Fertilizer is loaded in another pair of bins. One fertilizer bin serves two planting rows.
5. Fertilizer in the bin will move down a hose and is placed in the ground after the cutting wheel below cuts a line in the ground.		6. After moving down the road to a nearby field, large chains are put into place that serve as gears to drive the planter machine parts.
7. A guide (long pole at the right) is lowered that cuts a line into the ground for aligning the next rows.		8. This field, approximately 2 acres or 84,000 square feet can be planted in approximately 45 minutes.
9. The planted corn germinates in approximately 7 - 10 days. It is ready for harvest in approximately 90 days. Other corn ranges from 90 to 130 days to maturation (until it is ready to pick).		10. Corn begins to grow inside the husks. Here is an immature corn cob.
11. Delicious sweet corn is ripe and ready to pick using another machine - or is picked by hand. This field did not reach maturity due to the drought of 1999.		12. Normally sweet corn looks like this when it is mature. Sweet corn is usually eaten after heating the corn (by steaming, roasting, or boiling).
13. Field corn used for animal feed is dried on the stalk and then it is stored in corn cribs.		14. Note the air vent that helps to reduce rot. This vent goes back 7 ft. to the center of the corn crib and up to the top of the corn crib for ventilation.