2005 Spudnik 6400 Potato Bulker For Sale

From time to time, we decide to upgrade our equipment or thin out our collection of farming implements.  As a result, we have farm equipment to sell!

We just added a 2005 Spudnik 6400 potato harvester to our Equipment Sales pages (look under Potato Equipment).  This bulker has always been stored inside and comes with a multitude of features to ensure your potato harvest goes with as few issues as possible.  It’s in great shape, has a new elevator chain and comes with a spare tire, canopy, lights and cameras –  all you need to supply is the action!  Please feel free to check out the details on the link above, and if you’re interested, let us know.

Another item we’ve had for sale for some time is an Allis Chalmers 32′ tandem disc.  This disc folds for easy transport (to ten feet wide) and has recently had the bearings and hydraulics gone through.  Big bonus – we’ve significantly decreased the price!  If you have a field you need to work over, then you need to get in on this good deal while you can.

If you’re interested in either pieces of equipment, please feel free to get in touch with us at equipment.sales@golddustfarms.com.  And be sure to check back to see if we put anything else for sale!

farm, gold dust, walker brothers

. . . and a Happy New Year!

Snow is on the ground and cheer is in the air.  It looks quite a bit like Christmas around the Klamath Basin.  The holiday spirit is alive and well at Gold Dust!

Last Thursday (December 20th), if you visited the offices at the shed you may have noticed some of the office staff were dressed in “festive” (the word being a euphemism) sweaters.  Since these folks usually are sharper dressers than what the photos show, you can surmise it was the annual ugly Christmas sweater contest.  This year, there was a tie (who knew there could be two sweaters that terrible, right?) between Laura and Necia.  If you thought those were nice enough to wear to your Christmas dinner, you may want to fire your stylist.

The next day, Tacos Ala Mexicana were brought in for Christmas lunch for the shop, shed and office crews.  Tables were set up on the shed floor while Gold Dust’s employees visited and lunched on enchiladas, tacos, rice and beans.  After the cake was cut and served, on behalf of the partners, Weston thanked everyone for their continued hard work and dedication before wishing a Merry Christmas to all.

As you read in our last blog post “Gold Dust Hits The Road For Food Bank and SOOF“, Gold Dust donated 40,000 pounds of potatoes to Southern Oregon Outreach Foundation and the Klamath Lake Counties Food Bank.  Also in the blog post, you may have noticed the employees were raising money for Toys For Tots and the food bank.  How much was raised?  The employees pooled together $300, which was matched by Gold Dust’s partners to bring the total to $600 to be split evenly between the two organizations.  Well done!

Before wrapping up this post (unintentional Christmas pun!), on behalf of Bill, John, Weston and Tricia, we hope you had a Merry Christmas and wish you a Happy New Year.  And to our employees, who work in the shed, the fields, the shop and in our offices, again, thank you for everything you do to make Gold Dust and Walker Brothers successful.  Without our hardworking crews, we couldn’t be the best farm and processing plant in the Basin.  Thank you.

Here’s to a bright 2013!

farm, gold dust, gold dust office, holidays, potato shed, walker brothers

Quiet for now, this potato bulker is waiting to harvest another chipping potato field

Our potato fields are littered with the remnants of dead potato plants and chippers that didn’t make it through the bulker.  Tracks from our diggers and spud trucks have replaced the long rows of plants.  The bulkers and tractors are quiet, while the spud trucks have changed duties from hauling chipping potatoes from the fields to storage to hauling them from storage to the packing shed.

Potato harvest is over.

On Monday (October 15th), just before lunch, our last field was dug.  This year potato harvest lasted a little over a month, and considering the ground our harvest crews covered, it’s a pretty amazing feat.  We had spuds in fields we traditionally farm in the Leases as well as around Tulelake, Malin and Merrill.  However, this year we also farmed the Running Y Ranch, which didn’t add much to the acres we had to harvest, but it did add to the miles our equipment and crews had to cover.  And now that it’s all said and done, this year we had a beautiful crop with impressive yields.

So, how did we get through harvest so quickly?  To start with, we have a hard-working, experienced, dedicated crew who stepped up and put in the hours to make it happen.  From the guys on the bulkers to the folks in the spud trucks to everyone at the storage sheds, packing shed and in the office, every person worked hard to make potato harvest go as smoothly as possible.  We also had beautiful weather which allowed us to start on time every day and not wait for the day to warm up, or cool down, or the soil to dry out.  It’s been a beautiful fall for digging spuds!  Finally, we’ve been doing this for quite a while now.  Though every harvest is different and presents new challenges nobody could foresee, we’ve developed a knack for growing and harvesting chipping potatoes.

Before we get to some final pictures of potato harvest on the Running Y Ranch and around the Malin area, John, Bill, Weston and Tricia would like to thank the crews and staff for making this another successful potato harvest.  Everyone’s hard work is appreciated, and there is no crew around that’s better than the one that works for Gold Dust and Walker Brothers.  Thank you, everyone.  All of you helped make this a success.

Now, for some final potato harvest pictures!  And enjoy the Klamath Basin Potato Festival!

chipping potatoes, farm, gold dust, potato harvest, Running Y Ranch, walker brothers

No finer site than a big Lexion 750 cutting heavy grain

As we mentioned in our last post about chipping potato harvest getting underway, grain harvest is still going on.  Though we started grain harvest around Malin and have worked through a gigantic organic barley field on the Lower Klamath refuge, we’ve moved our combines down to the Running Y Ranch to harvest the wheat we planted there.

Though we’re proud of our chipping potatoes, raising grain is a major factor of our farming operation.  When Bill and John got together all those years ago, they focused on raising wheat, which is evident when you see the grain fields we’ve planted around the Klamath Basin.  To get some perspective on the impact of raising grain on our farm, and since our harvesters and focus is on the Running Y, let’s take a quick look at how much grain we planted there.  Out of the total acres we’re farming there, almost 67% of the ground is under wheat.  Now compare that to the other crops, we have 12% of the ground in chipping potatoes and almost 10% of it in alfalfa.  And in case you’re curious, we’ve dedicated almost 6% of the farm ground on the Running Y to the Walking Wetlands.  What is the percentage of acres in production that are organically farmed?  16.81%.

Why so much grain?  For starters, grain is a good market to be in, and John and Bill have been raising grain in the Klamath Basin since 1975.  Grain farming is also a part of our sustainable farming plan.  Potatoes take a lot of “power” out of the soil.  By rotating grain and alfalfa crops into fields that have either just been in spuds are or going into potatoes, we’re able to add organic material, nitrogen and other essential elements back into the ground.  This makes it so we rely less on fertilizer, which is better for the environment, for the soil itself and for our operating line.

With that in mind, while we’re excited about potato harvest, we have to remember how important grain harvest is to our farm as well. Let’s hope the skies stay blue, the grain continues to ripen nicely and we get the crop into storage safely.  Here’s to heavy yields!

farm, gold dust, grain, Running Y Ranch, sustainable farming, walker brothers, wheat

Let potato harvest begin!

After a year of new ground, stuck tractors and all the other drama that comes with farming, our potato bulkers are in the fields digging chipping potatoes. It’s official – potato harvest has began!

On Thursday, September 13th, we headed to the leases with our bulkers, tractors and spud trucks.  Though we started digging the on the 13th, we’ve been preparing for potato harvest for weeks.  Before the diggers can be pulled into the fields, they need to be prepped for the long hours ahead while the pipe crews pull solid set from the potato fields.  Rollers are dragged over the rows to kill the potato plants and the vines that have grown between the rows are cut.  Then, after all that prep work has been done, we can get the chippers out of the ground.

Every growing season is different and challenging, and this one was no different.  The threat of drought weighed heavy on the minds of farmers all over the Klamath Basin throughout the winter and early spring while fires from Northern California and Eastern Oregon filled the late summer skies with heavy smoke, leaving some to wonder if it would have a negative impact on the growth of crops throughout the area.  However, looking at the potato plants and evaluating the chipping potatoes themselves everything looks good!

Though we’ve cranked up our diggers to get the chipping potatoes out of the fields, the combines are still cutting grain for harvest and the third cutting of conventional and organic alfalfa hay is meeting the swathers and bailers.  It’s certainly a busy time of year for our farm crews, and we hope that everyone works as safely as they do hard.

So, before we get to a few pictures, let’s all hope for a safe and successful potato harvest.  Thank you to our hard working crews for the long hours you’re putting in.  Let’s have a great harvest!

Below are photos taken of the Stronghold Field and other leases we have on the Tule Lake Wildlife Refuge.  Photos from before potato harvest were taken on August 31st, two weeks before the potatoes were dug (September 14th).  In these images you can get a small glimpse of what we do to prepare for potato harvest, and then of those same chipping potatoes being harvested.  Enjoy!

chipping potatoes, farm, gold dust, potato harvest, walker brothers

A warm welcome from the Running Y staff

If you happened to look at  your calendar last week, you may have noticed the third Tuesday of August was already here.  Why does that particular Tuesday matter, you ask?  It’s time for the annual Open House Field Day, of course!

This year we held our 12th annual Open House Field Day on August 21st.  We were favored with a pleasant amount of sunshine and despite the large forest fires burning north, south and east of us, the wind kept the smoke at bay and the skies clear.  The day started with breakfast at the Running Y Lodge, where Weston and Kevin Kane from RaboBank put together a presentation.  Afterwards, the field tours commenced.

Since we’ve been working the Running Y Ranch this year and are proud of what we’ve accomplished in the several past months, we thought it was fitting to show off a couple of the potato fields we have planted there.  Weston, John and Dan fielded questions about the varieties, the soil and quality of the chipping potato crop.  Our guests were even treated to an impromptu lesson about potato plants and potato seed by none other than Duane “Sarge” Preston, professor emeritus from the University of Minnesota.  Not only is Sarge well-known, highly respected potato expert, he’s also an all-around nice guy.

After the tour of Running Y Ranch fields, everybody headed down to Malin to tour the packing shed.  Bill, John, Weston and plant manager Matt Thompson guided our guests through the packing shed and showed them samples of varieties our agronomist Daniel Jepsen dug up.  Along with fresh potato samples, the varieties were fried up to show how nicely they work for potato chips as well as to demonstrate the differences between varieties.  Discussions surrounded the quality of the chipping potatoes that were presented, and a few people even snuck a taste of the sample chips!

As we do every year, after the shed tour, we treated our guests to a round of golf at the Arnold Palmer-designed Running Y golf course.  Following golf, dinner was served at the club house where awards for longest drive, closest to pin, top team scores and lowest team scores were awarded.  Want to see those pictures?  You’ll have to tune in for our next blog post on the Open House Field Day!

chipping potatoes, customers and clients, farm, gold dust, open house field day, potato customers, potato shed, Running Y Ranch, walker brothers

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Why Farmers Curse and Drink

Ahhh yes, spring.  Around the Klamath Basin, snow is a distant memory (in theory, at least) and the first blossoms are pushing up through the ground.  Bushes and flowering trees are budding out, while groggy ground squirrels and rock chucks make their way from their burrows to bask in the warming sun  of May.  If you listen closely, you’ll not hear the melodious twittering of songbirds or the honking of honkers returning from Canada; no, the sound you hear is more primal.  It’s more guttural and full of frustration and agony.  If you listen closely, over the din of over-revved engines you can hear swearing and cursing as another tractor has found itself swallowed by the ground it was working.

And that is the reason why we waited so long to post these pictures!

If you’re keeping score from our other post, “Fun Times At The Running Y“, May was turning into an ugly month for farming on the Running Y.  Yes, the ground is lovely for growing crops and we received the precipitation we needed (though, in the form of snow at times).  However, all that beautiful dirt and precious rain meant more mud for our tractors to get stuck in.

For example, May 4, 2012, the Case 7130 that was swimming in soup found itself stuck again.  Like last time, it was filling in ditches.  However, unlike last time, it was a bit uglier with one of the front wheels ending up free of the tractor.

It’s just a little stuck. We’ve seen worse.

Oh, so THAT’s the problem!

The next day, May 5th, was double-rotten.  Field 8A, site of the “November Incident”,  claimed another victim.  An operator was working the field in a John Deere 8430T with a rototiller when low and behold, he found another spring hidden at the top of the field.  As Bart recalls, “[I] just saw this one in a different ditch a few days ago.”

Bart, why do you call this spring “special”? Ahh, ‘cuz we can’t use those other words on the blog. Got it!

But from this angle . . . yikes!

It doesn’t look so bad from this angle

That same day, in another field another tractor got stuck in another spring while disc-ing next to a ditch.  To make matters worse, when the cavalry arrived, they decided to free the disc from the tractor.  Why was that worse?  The operator neglected to mention there was a bolt in the bottom of the pin, so as they moved back and forth to help break the tractor free from the disc, they only ended up burying the John Deere 9620T even more.

Er, well, I guess you could say it’s really, really stuck

What can you say? It’s stuck!

Almost a full week later was another double-rotten day on the Running Y.  On May 11th, our John Deere 4960 ended up with its front wheels buried in the dirt.  The culprit?  You guessed – yet another spring!

Another hidden spring, another stuck John Deere

And that very same day comes our final entry.  A John Deere 4920 pulling our “famous board” ended up with its right side planted in the ground nearly up to its cab.  I’m only guessing here, but I have a hunch the culprit starts with “s” and end in “pring”.

Apparently the famous board’s fame isn’t derived from keeping tractors from getting stuck

Despite the challenges, and by challenges we mean getting stuck up to our cabs in soupy lake bottom and “special springs”, the Running Y Ranch is growing strong, beautiful crops and we have a collection of awesome photographs to show just how stuck equipment can get.  Now that everyone’s throats have healed from the yelling and screaming, harvest is right around the corner to throw even more adventure our way.  Let the good times roll!

farm, gold dust, Running Y Ranch, walker brothers

Here comes the Claas, making short work of this field

Driving around the Basin, fields of ripening wheat, barley and oats are turning from green to gold.  Combines are appearing almost from thin air, lining roads and sitting in front of shops and sheds being prepped for cutting.  In some fields, you can see where farmers took test passes.  As summer ends, grain harvest begins.

At our potato processing plant, we cut the wheat field directly south of the packing shed and solar panels.  Our big Claas with its 40 foot wide head made short work of the field, starting just before lunch and finishing the same evening.  To truly appreciate the efficiency of the combine, you have to be in the field and watch it work.  Modern combines with their floating heads and GPS units are able to cut grain just inches above the ground and maximize the amount of crop cut on each pass.  This machine not only allows us to harvest our grain in a more efficient manner, but we also are able to collect more of the grain cut.

While this is our first field harvested, it is certainly not our only field.  After this one, two other fields are ripe and ready to cut – and those are just the ones ready in the immediate future!  As August rolls on, you’ll see our grain trucks running from the fields to storage and our grain carts toted out to help collect the crop.  Though we spend a lot of time discussing chipping potatoes and writing about our packing shed, grain and hay are a part of the crops we rotate though in our sustainable farming plan.  So wherever you see a grain field, a potato field was there once!

farm, gold dust, grain, sustainable farming, walker brothers, wheat

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When Fields Attack!

Farming is truly an adventure.  And when you start farming acres that are new to you, not only is there a learning curve to figuring out the ground, the level of adventure is increased.  Especially when the fields start swallowing equipment whole.

Now that sufficient time has passed, we can look back at some of the more memorable adventures we’ve had on the Running Y Ranch and laugh.  Sure, at the time tension was high and tempers likely flared, but that’s all water under the bridge and we have photographic evidence (thanks to Mr. Crawford and the Apple company) of how much fun farming can be – that is if you find getting expensive pieces of farm equipment stuck fun!  From tractors to excavators, the Running Y tried to eat them all.  And while the old lake bed failed to consume our equipment, it did leave us with memories of fun times and adventures had.

The fun started in the fall, on November 30th, 2011.  As you can see from the photos, it was a beautiful, crisp day with blue skies, distracting us from what laid beneath.  One moment, smooth sailing.  Next – the ship – er, tractor – is sinking!  This tractor, a Caterpillar 865, was the largest tractor we had on the farm at the time.  It also has the dubious distinction of being the first one we got stuck on the Running Y.

Our first tractor stuck at the Running Y. Yay?

Methinks this is what literary folks call “foreshadowing”

Surely, it could be worse . . . .

Fast forward to spring, and farming and ditch cleaning are well underway.  As a matter of fact, Jim Hogue, a heavy equipment operator, was cleaning out the old canals on the Running Y on April 26th, 2012, when the bank of the ditch gave away.  And as you can see, there was now something else in the canal that needed to be cleaned out.

Umm, yeah. It doesn’t look much better from this angle either

I guess the good news is this isn’t our piece of equipment!

Three days later (April 29th), this classic example of a Case 7130 was filling in irrigation ditches in a pasture being reclaimed for farm ground.  And you can see how that went.  We must of just irrigated that pasture, right?  Nope.

Waiter, there’s a Case 7130 in this soup!

And another two days after that (May 1st, for those keeping track), our Caterpillar D6 managed to get stuck in the “famous” (or infamous) field B5.  This event was one of two times this Cat was stuck in this field.  And do you see the rippers on the rear of the dozer? Yeah, me neither.  But if you could, you’d know that they’re not supposed to even touch the ground.  In case you were wondering, it took Hogue’s excavator and two tractors to free the D6 from soft ground.

I’ll be – there are rippers down in there!

Damn. Just . . . . damn.

One day later (lookit that pattern!), May 2nd, while trying to fill in old ditches this John Deere 8430T pulling a rototiller got stuck.  While we tried to blame the field for this one, unfortunately there was a wee bit of operator error in this incident when the operator crossed the ditch wrong.  As far as getting stuck in ditches, this rototiller completed its hat trick this day!

If this is the worst thing that happened this day, we should consider ourselves lucky

Finally, a day with no tractors getting stuck.  No excavators sliding into ditches or Cats managing to bury themselves in the old lake bed fields.  So, we celebrated with a rainbow!  Okay, perhaps we didn’t make the rainbow, but it’s pretty cool just the same.

A happy ending . . . or is it?

Too bad there weren’t any more photos of tractors getting stuck on the Running Y ranch, right?  Well, you’re in luck!  Stay tuned for part two of  Fun Times At The Running Y, or Farm Equipment – It’s What’s For Dinner.

farm, gold dust, Running Y Ranch, walker brothers

A beautiful July day = happy chipping potatoes!

As you may have read our lament in a previous post, potato planting season wasn’t without it’s challenges, and those challenges made the season last a little longer than usual.  Considering we had a fresh coating of snow on the Basin floor the first week of June, you’d think our chipping potato crop would be way behind.  However, the spuds are growing right along!

We normally like to have the rows of the potato fields grown in by the 4th of July.  While not all of our fields were quite to that point, two of the first fields we planted by the shed were close – very close.  Compared to years past, you would think we were right on schedule!  Though we had that very thin blanket of snow late in the Spring, we’ve been blessed with a lot of sun and very temperate weather.  As a result, our chipping potato fields are looking pretty good.

If you look at the photos below, you can see the progress they made from July 3rd to the following weeks.  The Northcut field, located directly south across Micka Road from our packing shed, had the rows almost grown in.  The week after (July 10th), the plants were growing into the rows and by the 18th, the rows were completely grown in and nearly impossible to walk through.  Looking at the field located on our processing plant campus, you can see on July 3rd the rows were almost grown in as well.  A week later, the potato plants are starting to blossom.

Living and working around alfalfa, wheat and potatoes, we sometimes take for granted how quickly these plants grow.  An alfalfa field cut towards the end of June is almost ready for it’s second cutting.  And as you can see, if you give the chipping potatoes water, warm weather and a bit of sun, they quickly respond with vibrant green growth.  You can add that to yet another reason it’s great to live in the Klamath Basin and to be a part of the ag community!

chipping potatoes, farm, gold dust