Field Notes

Bouldin Alfalfa: 2023-01-06 13:55:00 (DOY 6)
Author: Daphne Szutu
Others: Dennis

Summary: Regular data collection/cleaning, sheep have come and gone, wet roads, straighted PL Arable post, storms this week and more rain to come

2023-01-06
Bouldin Alfalfa

Dennis and I arrived at 13:55 PST. It was mostly overcast, with a breeze from the south picking up throughout the afternoon. We’ve had a string of atmospheric river storms since late December. More storms with potentially high wind are expected this weekend and next week.

The gravel levee road had some wet puddles which were passable but not that great. Several large pieces of farm equipment were parked up on the levee road closer to the Hwy 12 overpass, and one or two more were parked on the levee slope. In case the island floods, I guess.

We ran into Russ Ryan while we were at Bouldin Corn and he said the alfalfa fields are probably replanted every 5-7 years. He thinks that’s the plan for all of the alfalfa fields in our corner of the island but he needs to check in with Rob, the owner of Sierra Cattle, to confirm. He initially said that they could work around us since we were on the very edge of the field, but I said we could move our equipment if we knew when. He said to follow up in about a month because after it stops raining, the farmers will wait for a few weeks before doing more groundwork.

Something has been planted and is coming up in neat rows on the fields that were previously alfalfa. Too early to say what it is for sure but Joe thinks it’s the same winter wheat that’s planted by our corn field.

The dirt road leading from the levee to the field wasn’t too wet. Dennis didn’t want to compact the wet field by driving on it, so we parked on the edge and walked in. Dennis did his “farmer’s carry” workout by carrying the toolbox.

Sheep were on the alfalfa two fields to our east. Sheep have been through our field and all the alfalfa has been chewed down to the nub. We walked by a dead lamb on the way from the truck to the tower. The alfalfa left under the tower is about 10-15cm but I didn’t cut it today. The cutting tools were back in the truck and the alfalfa won’t be changing much in the next few weeks.

The PL Arable was slightly tilted and the solar panel wire had been chewed off. I removed the solar panel and we straightened the orange pole by screwing the ground anchor into the ground and adjusting the three eye-bolts holding the pole. This setup will need to be re-done at some point because the anchor is so far in the ground it’s getting hard to turn the eye-bolts.

I downloaded met, cam, USB GHG, FD, and IRT data. Dennis cleaned rad sensors but the CO2 sensor was clean so he didn’t need to clean it. I changed the eddy clock about +2min to match the laptop time from 14:01 to 14:03 and restarted logging.

The 7500 read: 419ppm CO2, 468mmol/m3 H2O, 14.6C, 102.2kPa, 104SS

We left at 14:20 PST.

Next Mowing: 2023-01-11

2 photos found

20230106BA_EmptyDitch.jpg ( 2023-01-06 13:52:23 ) Full size: 1920x1440
Sheep on neighboring alfalfa field, empty irrigation ditch, and Dennis doing his "farmer's carry" workout by carrying the toolbox to the tower