Canadian Food Grains Bank

What do you get ,when you have over 120 combines in a 160 acre soybean field? Besides a lot of noise and a lot of dust flying around, after 11 minutes and 43 59/100 seconds, you get a new world record! All the proceeds from the combined beans will go to the Canadian Food Grains Bank and the government will match this money 4 times.

 

The Canadian Food Grains Bank was formed by a group of churches and as the name implies, tries to help get food to people in need. The first we heard about this plan was in the winter: by then, everything had been donated, from land, to seed and fertilizer. Later came the call for combines. I was after Laurence to go, but he figured that our combine would not be big enough. The big day was last Friday, but it was rained out. The second try came on Monday, again a rainy day, but today was just perfect.  We had seen a few combines go past here and we are about 40 km from Moncton. Shawn was there with one of the dealership combines and so was his father -in-law with his combine. But Shawn did not get to drive and so watched it with us.

Once I looked at the pictures at home I noticed him on the right of the first picture. By 1:30 it was time to go and it was something to see. The combines started from both sides, one with 65 and the other with 55 and they met in the middle, where an area had been combined before.  A big worry would be any machines that quit for whatever reason, and there were some that could not keep up.

 

As the combines came closer, so came the dust. But after 11:43:59 minutes the horn went and it was all over.  Or really it just started, because all these beans had to be sold by auction!

 

We went home soon after, but Shawn phoned just now and we heard, that the first 10 bags of beans sold for $1000 each and were donated back and then resold for the same amount. We will have to wait for the final tally for a while. And you cannot have a farmer do without food. I do not know, how they did it. This all happened way back in a field with no hydro in sight. There was one tent, where you could buy beef or pork on a bun, all donated and ice cream, coffee and apples. All they asked for was a donation. And there were hundreds of people.

 

On the home front things are not going as well. Last Thursday night we got a call from the hospital. My mother-in-law had fallen and was taken to the hospital: she had 2 broken ribs and she is still in the hospital and she is in a lot of pain.

 

Today we had great weather and we hope to start with the harvest tomorrow. So we keep our fingers crossed and hope for a lot of sunshine in the coming weeks.