End of Summer--or the last cutting of hay

  About this time of year, the last cutting of hay takes place here in the Western Treasure Valley. This is what it looks like on our farm. First the swather cuts it and arranges it into rows.

After being cut, it drys from one to several days in the field, depending on the moisture in the air. During the drying period hay is in the most danger of damage. Rain during this time can rot the alfalfa and make it unfit to be fed to the animals.

We have been in a drought much like the Mid-west, but we have reservoirs holding vast amounts of water saved from the winter snows. During the summer growth period we can irrigate the fields. When its dry, the baler moves in and makes short work of the large 3' x 4' x 8' bales.

 It takes a lot of practice and a talented loader driver to stack ten 1300 pound bales onto each flatbed truck. Fully loaded, the trucks carry over 13,000 pounds with each load.

 The thirteen tons of hay loaded on these two trucks is on it's way to the stack yard.

In the end, from this cutting, we have around 260,000 pounds of hay, finished and ready to be fed throughout the winter. Next spring, the cycle will start all over again. 
If you've never stood in a blooming alfalfa field, let me assure you those small purple flowers are among the most aromatic blooms in the world.

The LOOK Challenge from Jacquie Rogers

I've been tagged.

According to the rules, you're supposed to do a search in your work in progress for the word "look" and then paste the surrounding paragraph(s) and tag as many people as possible.   

 

Okay, here goes.Sean O'Connell's life has been great until this year. He has spent his time riding bulls and winning. After the rodeos, the party begins. Life was great until this summer. His winning streak slowed to a crawl. He finds himself without enough money to go to Arizona to the winter rodeos and has to get a real job. 

After being on the losing end of a run-in with his brother-in-law, he needs the soothing comfort of a beer and just happens to find the Sugarwater Bar.

                                                          

                                                                      ********

            “You don’t look so good, partner. Run into a fist?” The old man behind the bar cackled, as he served a beer to the only other patron, a woman who fit the bar stool like a saddle on a duck.

            “Just get me a boilermaker and cut the jokes,” Sean said as he dropped onto a stool and leaned his fore arms against the bar. He was in no mood to play games.

            The bartender drew a beer and poured the shot. Sean grabbed the whiskey and threw it back. He grimaced then lifted the mug and sucked down the beer.

            “Hit me again,” he growled, slamming the mug onto the bar and sliding it toward the bartender.

            “Looks like you’ve already been hit.”

             The sharp bark of laughter made Sean grind his teeth. His muddled brain had just enough clarity to know if he wanted another drink, he’d have to control his temper. “Boilermaker, please.”

            “I’ll have to see some cash first,” the older man said. “You’ve stiffed us before.”

            “Not me. I’ve never been here before. Besides, I always pay my way.” Sean concentrated, trying to get a clear picture of the old man before him. He couldn’t quite see the bartender, but he was sure he hadn’t been to this place before.

            “Sure you do, sonny, but we run a cash-up-front system.”

            God, he hated to beg, but at this point, he’d do about anything for another drink. “I’m flat broke, but I get paid Friday. I’ll bring in the money then if you’ll let me have one more tonight.”  He even sounded pitiful to his own ears.

            Without taking his eyes off Sean, the bartender called out. “Junior, we have us a moocher here, and it’s time for him to leave.”

            “I’ll pay twice what you charge, if you’ll run a tab until Friday,” Sean said. “Come on, help me out.” When had he been reduced to begging? There had been a time when he entered a joint like this as if he owned it.

            A young man the size of Bigfoot came into the bar from the back room. “Him, Papa?” he said, as he approached.

            The bartender looked at Sean and asked, “You want to leave on your own or have Junior help you?”

            Sean would’ve liked to save face and leave under his own power, but he couldn’t seem to get off the stool. With resignation, he laid his head on the bar and waited. At least he was drunk enough that he might not feel the blows until tomorrow.

I'm tagging:

Amity Grays @amitygrays

Dianne Solberg @wxmouse

Kristi Atkinson @kristyatkinson

Penny Watson @PennyRomance

 

 

The Higgs Boson Discovery Explained by Someone Who is There

My guest blogger today is Joe Bochenek, a Ph.D student at Florida State University. He is working at CMS, one of the experiments at the Large Hadron Collider, located on the border between Switzerland and France.The LHC announced observation of a new particle on July fourth.

Stephanie--Joe, what can you tell us about the amazing discovery that has taken place at the LHC?

Large Hadron Collider

Joe--The exciting thing about the LHC is that it is on the absolute boundary of human knowledge about nature.  There is a theory called the Standard Model of Particle Physics that describes all of the matter that we know about, from stars to the particles that make up a new born baby, to more exotic forms of matter.  Everything we have observed experimentally fits in to this eloquent mathematical framework, and this framework can be used to make predictions to fantastic accuracy.  

The only problem is that the framework, by itself, is incomplete - it has a mathematical inconsistency. To fix this, some very smart theoretical Physicists, including Peter Higgs, proposed an addition to the theory.  This addition is called the Higgs field (keep this distinct in your mind from the Higgs boson, which is related but not the same).  The Higgs field "fixes" the standard mode so that the Standard Model gives us everything: a theory that describes all that we have seen in experiments over the last 100 years or more, and complete mathematical consistency.  But if we include this modification to the theory we get some extra baggage, and that baggage is called the Higgs boson.  

The Higgs boson is a particle predicted by the Standard Model if we include the Higgs field -- it MUST exist if the Higgs field exists, so we should be able to see it in our experiments.  No Higgs particle, no Higgs field, no consistency, and thus our theory is wrong, and there must be something else that we don't know about or haven't been clever enough to think up.

 

         Electromagnets at the LHC

However, on July 4th the world saw evidence for a particle that is consistent with a Higgs boson.  If, upon further scrutiny, it turns out to be the Higgs field, then the theorists who proposed it 50 years ago will be very happy.  

Then again, it could be something else.  It could be something that is imitating the Higgs field, or it could be a brand of Higgs boson a bit different from the one predicted.  In either case it would mean that there is more in nature than our theory tells us.  But this is actually a good thing because we can use this new particle, whatever it is, to try to determine the real theory that explains everything.  That is, at least if we're wrong, we have a lead.  When we have more data we will be able to measure the properties of this new particle and better determine if it is a Higgs boson, or if not, we can see more clearly what it is.

Now I should mention that Cosmological experiments tell us that normal matter -- quarks, electrons and the other particles described by the standard model -- only make up 4% of the universe.  The rest of the universe is comprised of so-called "dark matter" and "dark energy".  

We don't know ANYTHING about this stuff, but we can see that it is there by the way stars move around each other.  So even if the particle we observe is a Standard Model Higgs boson, and the Standard Model is shown to be right, we still have a lot to learn about the universe, and we hope that we can catch some hint of what is out there using the LHC, in concert with other experiments.  

Also, we know that even if we have found the Higgs, that the standard model doesn't explain gravity.  So there are many problems left unsolved.  But that is the nature of pure science: you don't know what you will find until you look.  You don't know what will be the windfall a particular experiment, either technologically, scientifically or just in terms of human edification, until you look over that next mountain.  Or maybe you won't find anything at all (of course, we're pretty sure we would find something otherwise we wouldn't have built the experiment and dedicated many sleepless nights to making it work).  And so the observation of this new particle at the LHC is very encouraging.

I think this is a good video explaining the Higgs better than I could (and the artwork is cool):

http://www.phdcomics.com/comics.php?f=1489

Or for something less colorful, here is the CERN press release from July 4th:

http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2012/PR17.12E.html

Stephanie--Joe, thank you for your explanation. I think I understand a little more about this fascinating subject. Keep us up to date on any new discoveries.

Joe--Thank you.