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Post by rscott on Jul 2, 2012 22:47:35 GMT -5
The coastal dwellers have their hurricane and tropical storm thread, I thought I'd start one for us landlocked storm chasers. So far this summer in the Dakotas I've only had marble sized hail but there was no wind and it fell straight down doing little damage to my gardens. I'm under a severe storm watch at present and I can see the lightening approaching so I'll stay up until it passes. For those of you unfamiliar with shear winds, they are 200 mile per hour winds that drop out of the sky without the rotation of a tornado. Tornadoes get blamed for the majority of shear wind damage but the damage looks quite different if you're familiar with both. This is the kind of damage they can do ---  The undamaged bin behind was full, the damaged one is half full and had it been empty it would be gone. A wooden structure wouldn't stand a chance. One of these grain drying bins holds over a million dollars worth of wheat. My uncles own quite a few full ones. |
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Post by watershield on Jul 3, 2012 2:19:59 GMT -5
Yep some fairly nasty weather all over the place.
A Million dollars each...seems a tad high.
Those look like 65,000 bushel capacity bins and I believe the price of Wheat down there is around the $8.00 - 8.13 range, so if they were both full...yes. But just one is closer to $520,000. Still, a fair chunk of change.
I was a farm banker for 15 years
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Post by rscott on Jul 3, 2012 5:10:39 GMT -5
I wish, hard red is down to $7.25.
You might be right about 65,000, I'm trying to get scale against the tractor, these aren't our bins, they were north of here 15 miles.
My uncles have built a 120,000 bushel dryer every year for the last four. With state and federal grants and financing they're almost giving these things away. I'd like to own a few full of soybeans.
Now they and some other local farmers have co-oped to build an 80 rail car grain loading terminal.
Where abouts were you doing your farm banking??
With our state owned Bank of North Dakota we do things a little different.
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Post by watershield on Jul 3, 2012 16:22:04 GMT -5
Most of my farm lending career was in Central and Northern Alberta.
In 1993 I moved into head office collections department in a work out situation. We'd identify farms and companies that were showing signs of trouble, go on site to view the operation, meet the owners and try to find ways to reduce debt and improve cash flow. The goal being to keep them on the land.
Not always possible so it often became a matter of assisting them through a liquidation, sometimes forced.
Did that for 5 years then went back to Commercial lending up in Fort McMurray. Financing Hotel construction, oil field equipment, etc, in the 5 - million range.
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Post by rscott on Jul 3, 2012 18:19:10 GMT -5
Farm bankers aren't looked upon favorably in the US farm states, most are perceived as working with the enemy, Wall Street and the Federal Reserve.
The Bank of North Dakota is basically a state owned credit union only available to residents. They have the same power as a branch of the Federal Reserve but don't take orders from them.
We set our own interest rates based on the economic health of the state (which is number one in the nation), not what the Feds try to dictate.
The bank is a throw back to the socialists that homesteaded the state.
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Post by watershield on Jul 3, 2012 18:41:29 GMT -5
I here ya. I worked for basically the same type of bank, Alberta Treasury Branch.
It was a Provincially owned bank since the 40's then became a crown corporation in the 90's. All that means is that we still reported to the Provincial government but no longer took orders from every politicial in office.
We didn't get regulated by the Feds, rather worked under a Provincial mandate. In about 2000, they started hiring Chartered bank people, mostly from the Royal Bank and Bank of Montreal. All of us "old timers" got shuffled to the side and in 2003 anyone nearing early retirement got down sized. (including me)
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Post by rscott on Jul 3, 2012 21:23:28 GMT -5
Old timers up north reminds me of my crazy old uncle Ab.
He retired from the RCMP in Manitoba in the 20's and moved to Whitehorse to raise horses.
He lived in a tent for forty years.
I wanted to visit him but he died while I was in college.
I did inherit his guns which include a 32-20 Colt revolver marked RCMP and worth a small fortune.
People who have known us both say we're a lot alike.
Crazy
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Post by The Mad Hatter on Jul 4, 2012 11:28:00 GMT -5
Pretty sure we call them straight line winds and they are a bitch. Down in New Mexico we would get caught in giant dust devils, those things would rock the crap out of the RV.
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Post by rscott on Jul 4, 2012 14:37:04 GMT -5
In the old days before no till and tractor cabs, a dust devil would sand blast your skin off.
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Post by watershield on Jul 5, 2012 2:08:10 GMT -5
Pretty sure we call them straight line winds and they are a bitch. Down in New Mexico we would get caught in giant dust devils, those things would rock the crap out of the RV. That;s correct. Watched it on the news the other night. Winds from 150 -200 MPH along a front 400 miles long. |
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Post by marisol on Jul 8, 2012 11:00:11 GMT -5
We had our first severe thunderstorm of the summer yesterday. Blew the petals off my flowers.
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Post by rscott on Jul 8, 2012 16:02:33 GMT -5
OOOOhhhh - NNNNooooo...................
I feel your pain, petals don't last long in our N.Dak wind either.
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