Our milo crop has been harvested. 

While I feel very blessed, thanks to the abundant moisture we had this past summer, for the great crop we brought into the bin, I also feel a little sad saying goodbye to the beautiful fall color.

Milo is a grain sorghum.  It grows well in Kansas where there is typically less moisture than in the corn belt.  In the United States it’s used mostly as cattle feed, but it is also palatable for humans, and used for that purpose in other countries.  Depending on the hybrid, it grows two to five feet tall, with large, heavy heads filled with grain.  It’s harvested using a combine with the same header as used for wheat.

Planted in spring and harvested in fall, the milo hybrids are designed to grow on shorter, thicker stalks that make the crop less susceptible to the strong winds that typically accompany a summer thunderstorm.  But in virtually every field you will find a rebel stalk – some throwback to an earlier generation – that refuses to conform, and instead, still reaches for the sky.

Unlike wheat harvest, I have no cherished childhood memories of milo harvest.  That could be because school was in session during milo harvest, but I think it is more likely that my father simply didn’t plant milo.  Because he ran a dairy, he planted forage sorghum instead of grain sorghum.  This type of sorghum can be shocked and stored like hay, or made into silage.  It is finely chopped, then pressed into a pit and covered by plastic.  Nature converts it into a succulent feed through the process of anaerobic bacterial fermentation. 

I do have memories of our silage pit, but I’m not sure that I consider them “cherished”.  I remember how steam would rise off the pit on a cold, winter day.   I have memories of my dad using a pitchfork to toss the silage to our dairy cows in winter.  And I remember the sickly, sweet smell of the fermented sorghum as the dairy cows greedily devoured the tasty treat.

But without a doubt, my favorite fall harvest memory occurred during the fall of my senior year in high school.  Danny and I were already dating steadily, and had planned on a Saturday evening date.  But my dad needed help shocking feed, so I had to tell Danny the date was canceled.  Instead of being upset at either me or my dad, he offered to help with the shocking.  I think it was his willingness to forego dinner and a movie to instead help me with my farm chores with which I first fell in love.

Or it could have been that wavy, blond hair.

(Autographed copies of all three of my books are now available from Kansas Originals through my website, yearonthefarm.com)

Next week:  Preparing for Winter