posted: Sep 17, 2008


Harvesting the 5 acre field of western yarrow (Achillea millefolium) last week was a bit more work than we bargained for. To begin with Wayne brought the combine through the field and we dumped the material from the combine into 6 large white bags. Ideally we planned to store the yarrow in these bags and until we were ready to clean the seed. 



However, although the seed was dry and shattering out of the seed heads, the plants were still retaining a lot of moisture (as witnessed by the condensation accumulating on the inside of the bags).  This moisture could potentially ruin the seed so it became clear that we needed to get the material out of these bags and let it dry out.  We then transported the bags to the barn and with the help of a tractor, shovels, tarps, and a lot of man and woman-power we spread it out to dry. 



Once spread out everything dried quickly and our next challenge became how to get all of this material off the ground, cleaned, and ready for sale.  The answer would be shovels, containers and a lot of time feeding it through our seed cleaner.  We are about 1/3 of the way through and look forward to the day when there is no more yarrow to shovel!