A New World Record

congrats Sask!

Good show! Congrats!

Wondering- A whole line of combines moving right to left. Were half of them picking up swaths 'backwards', or did the swathers go back 'empty' to set up the combine line show?

Oops! One poor Yellow guy left in the dust. Embarassing or what?? On other side, combine line is finished, but in the distance appears a couple of casualties also.

But, well done!

Excellent!
And "All glory to God"

That is the coolest thing. Way to go!

Amazing what people can do when they, ahem, combine their efforts.

@Snagglepuss

The swaths ran east to west with a 20 foot section in the middle roped off as a walkway. Most of the combines (about 190-200, I think) started in the east and moved west to the walkway, and the other 60 or so started in the west and moved east. So in the middle picture on that link, west is to the left, and east is to the right. The one group was shorter because on the south west end of the field they had a spectating/parking area, with concession stands and an old time threshing demonstration. I think they probably just picked up the swaths backwards, although I can't remember for certain. Oat straw is so slippery I am not sure it would have been any easier to pick it up forwards.

The wind was from the west. I was a photographer for the event (I have a few more pictures on my blog, still working through editing them all) and was assigned a group of 20 combines on swaths 229-249, so they were on the far north end in the smaller group moving east (the group on the left). Got a faceful of dust for 5-7 straight minutes, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. It was an amazing experience, and I was honoured to be a part of it. And the most amazing thing is that if they had 40 more swaths those would have been full too. They had to stop accepting combineregistrations a few days before the event because the swaths were all full. So cool

Congrats flatlanders!

Oh phil, that you could see us in this hour.

Oh yeah, and the shorter line was finished slightly sooner, because those swaths were not as long as the ones on the other side of the walkway. Just in case you were wondering.

All the swaths were picked up properly,a long swathing job. There were 169 combines on the east side, 1 mile in length. The area combined by the east side was exactly 160 acres, hopefully a second world record for the fastest 1/4 section combined. Some combines were turned away because of a lack of swaths, the only disappointing part of the day.

Black Mamba, somewhere phil is looking down on Saskatchewan and....

...chewing off his own tongue in anger.

"All glory goes to God... and the record goes to Saskatchewan"

Well said... and well done!

Yes, we don't give glory enough to our Lord.

Immensely cool. Congrats SK and thanks Kat!

Combines 59 &60. Yes, every 2nd swath was reverse cut, but it didn't matter because we were required to drive so slowly to ensure we worked the full 5 minutes. Our combines could have probably handled 3 times the load, but there are older models likely running near capacity. We're all donating our time and equipment for a good cause, and it turned out to be a very pleasant and uplifting experience. Thanks for posting.

This was a great effort by all involved. There will be many disadvantaged kids that will benefit from these people that gave their time and expensive to operate machines. Our tenant had four machines there.

blueteck, aye.

Thank you Kate for posting this.

Pretty far out. Way to go!!

Stupid question here. Even this late in the season the wheat is cut and arranged into windrows before the combine is brought in? I've never seen that in Ontario, the combine does it all in one pass. The combines in the pics seem to have very wide heads many times the width of the windrow. What gives?

Well done, Saskatchewans!!

Between 50 and 100 million bucks worth of equipment out there. Very impressive. Kudos to the guys and gals that swathed that field. That was the real work.

@Al in Ottawa. Ontario wheather conditions are far more favorable to "Straight combining" but in many parts of the Prairies - snow and heavy rains can delay harvest until late, late - thus swathing into windrows - which can actually survive a Winter (poorer grades though).

The width has to do with an industry standard so if things (weather) get really fine - it allows for Straight combining.

@Al in Ottawa

We generally straight cut out here too, however, this was oats, and at least on our farm, you generally have to swath the oats down so that it ripens properly and evenly. I suspect that it was swathed down so that more combines could fit on the field (Pick up headers are narrower than straightcut headers so narrower headers=more space for more combines) and so that the combines could go side by side, since I think when you straight cut with a bunch of combines, you have to stagger them back.
And as for the width of the header, that's just how they are made, I think. It allows more room to move the combine around when harvesting, and still fit the whole swath onto the header.
Of course I could be wrong. A more experienced farmer might be able to explain it better.

@Al in Ottawa

We generally straight cut too, however, this was oats, and at least on our farm, you generally have to swath the oats down so that it ripens properly and evenly. I suspect that it was swathed down so that more combines could fit on the field (Pick up headers are narrower than straightcut headers so narrower headers=more space for more combines) and so that the combines could go side by side, since I think when you straight cut with a bunch of combines, you have to stagger them back.
And as for the width of the header, that's just how they are made, I think. It allows more room to move the combine around when harvesting, and still fit the whole swath onto the header.
Of course I could be wrong. A more experienced farmer might be able to explain it better.

Oops, that posted twice for unknown reason. Sorry.

LS and Kat, thanks for the info. I didn't even know that such a practice as swathing existed, and as for the idea of leaving grain in windrows over the winter I would never have believed it. Here the wildlife would eat most of it and the rest would rot due to the frequent thaws.

WOW! Well done to all involved!
What a wonderful site! Copious amounts of diesel being burnt...dust clouds...and mmmmm porridge in the raw form.

"All glory goes to God... and the record goes to Saskatchewan"

Well said... and well done!
Posted by: Derek at October 16, 2012 12:05 AM

I agree with you, Derek.