A day at the farm

On the farm.

To give: JON'S MDA DRIVE


Jerry Schillinger remembers driving a tractor for his dad as a boy, pulling a trailer that spanned 10 rows. He was out in the sun for hours. One day his dad attached a radio to the tractor and it made the job more fun. Then he put an umbrella over the driver's seat to offer shade. The boy might've thought that was about as far as you could go in making a hard job comfortable.

Today Jerry has a sprayer that has an air-conditioned cab, a full sound system, and drives itself using GPS. It covers scores of rows, and keeps track of what it has done and doesn't have to do, shutting off specific spray valves when it hits, say, an irregular edge, saving spray. A field that might have taken full days to treat is now done in a matter of hours. It's just one of the many miracles of modern farming that Jerry Schillinger employs.

On Thursday, July 4, through my amorphous network, the Schillinger's invited me to their house in Circle (blueberry pancakes!) and, with the whole family, to their son Brett's house out on the farm for a barbecue of stuffed burgers and chops. There was a lot of food.

I asked Jerry a lot of questions -- probably too many questions -- about his farming operation, and he was happy to show me around. They don't have livestock; they grow crops. This year they have their 6,500 acres planted in wheat, peas and lentils. The peas are not eaten as sweet peas, but are dried and, because they have a lot of nutritional value, they or their ingredients become part of foods that you may not associate with peas (I hope I have this right).

The wheat, Jerry said, may be used in bread, of course. A single, beadlike grain of wheat has two parts. The husk, or bran, and the white interior. It's actually the bran that has most of the nutritional value of wheat -- so whole wheat bread, raisin bran, foods like that, are more nutritious than white breads, like Wonder Bread, which have the bran removed through milling. I suppose this is widely known, but hearing it, right there at the source where it starts -- well, it seemed profound to me.

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The kids -- Brett and his wife's four kids -- were all over at the farm. They have a full playground, and lots of vehicles, including mini ATVs. Biking, as I am, you do come to recognize the advantages of a motor, and, for getting around on a farm, well, two pedaled wheels just don't cut it.

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I just want to thank publicly the Schillinger family for including me so completely in their holiday. I hope that some day I can repay it.

Kenny and Sage

Jerry and Carol Schillinger (left and right) and their friend Pete.