—Lancaster Fanning, Saturday, January 28,1978 38 Farm trucking (Continued from Page 23) best to have their lanes open ed in time, a few problem situations always come up. One of the most annoying is to have to put on and remove several sets of tire chains numerous times per route. This is very time consuming and causes a lot of the delays truckers encounter. “We can’t afford to leave our chains on when the roads are free of snow,” said one hauler, “but we frequently need tham to get in and out of farm lanes. Whenever a storm comes up, the first decision a dispatcher for a hauling firm is faced with is whether or not to send the trucks out at regular times or not Many truckers, for instance, begin their runs very early in the morning, possibly even as early as 2 a.m. During bad weather situations, it’s often best to wait until at least daylight before the truck begins to roll to its destina tion. On Friday, Jan. 20, not a single truck left the Ewell terminal in Lancaster Coun ty. Readers will remember that one of the worst storms in years hit Pennsylvania on that day. With roads being closed, Sheaffer really had no other choice but to keep the trucks at home. The following day, Satur day, presented Sheaffer with the impossible task of pick ing up milk for that day and the day before. It can’t be done, he admitted, so the next step is to study the routes carefully and begin picking up those who are the most desperate. Often this means just picking up some of the milk for the time be Corn and soybean day slated HERSHEY - A tri-county corn and soybean conference has been scheduled to take place here on Feb. 9 in the Heritage Room of Founders Hall. Dauphin, Lebanon and Lancaster County’s Ex tension Services are spon soring the day’s activities, which begins at 9:30 a.m. and will end at 3 p.m. At lunch, costing ap proximately $2.50 will be provided. Advance reser vations will be necessary and are to be turned into one of the above mentioned Extension Service offices by Feb. 1. Topics to be discussed during the program include fertility, micro nutrients, storage and handling, fitting corn and soybeans into the Future’s puzzle, weed control, and economics of com and soybean produc tion. Also, winners of the Five Acre Com Club Contest will be announed and Dauphin County com and weed plots will be discussed. Speakers for the day’s activities include Willis McClellan, agronomist; Joseph McCurdy, agricultural engineer; H Louis Moore, agricultural economist, and Fred ing, leaving the fanner with just enough room in his tank to do another milking or two, instead of four or more. To get it all done, drivers oftentimes work around the clock. They’re dedicated men with awesome respon sibilities. Not only do they have to worry about their patrons and the products they carry, they’re in com mand of extremely heavy vehicles which are worth |70,000 each, minus the load. The larger tank trailers plus tractor weigh 73,000 pounds when loaded. Ac cording to Sheaffer, that’s the maximum gross weight allowed in Pennsylvania. The tractors usually cost in the neighborhood of $40,000 each, with stainless and aluminum trailers going for an additional $30,000. Handl ing one of those rigs, which is 50 feet in length, can be very treacherous on slick roads and farm lanes. Dairymen undoubtedly remember the days when milk trucks were much smaller. Pick-ups were easier to make then, admits Sheaffer. But the larger trucks became necessary when milk was being moved longer distances. Today’s tankers are admittedly over sized for many Pennsylvania dairy farms, making it dif ficult for drivers to maneuver them around buildings and twisty lanes. Hauling as much as 9,600 gallons when fully loaded, the large rigs have been the answer to keeping hauling costs more economical than they would have been other wise. One of the drivers em ployed by Ewell is Ronald Hughes, farm management specialist. All are on the staff of Penn State University. Chairmen for the event are Denis Hoke and Arnold Lueck, Extension agents for Lebanon and Lancaster County, respectively. Brown of Intercourse. Now in his sixth year as a driver for the milk hauling firm, Brown admits that after a couple of *■' miserable weather, he wonders why he keeps at it. And he honestly can’t tell you why, either. There’s a lot he likes about his job, he says, but the going is pretty rough sometimes, and easier jobs could be found. Brown smiled modestly as he went over some of the details of his job. “Truckers help each other,” he said simply, “and farmers are pretty good too in helping out. They want their milk picked up.” He admits a job such as his isn’t easy, especially when 175 miles have to be covered on snow covered roads with foggy ' conditions on top of it. “It takes a particular kind of wife, too,” added the veteran driver. acknowledging that the family has to be un derstanding of the cir cumstances. Brown picks up milk from Vpett&use WEDNESDAY, FEDRUARYI,I97B £OO AM. TO tOO PA NEW NEBRASKA OPEN FRONT SWINE HOUSE Sponsored By MOYER & SON FEED CO. Supplier of Feed AGRI-EQUIPMENT Supplier of Equipment LINBACH CONSTRUCTION Builder Located at 808 GERMAN'S FARM on Castle Rd. in Steinsburg, PA. Go North on Allentown Rd. to Steinsburg Rd. left on Steinsburg Rd., turn right on Castle Rd. Farm on right V* mile ahead. For information Phone: 215-536-2173 DOOR PRIZES | [REFRESHMENTS 20 farms on most days. Lately that has meant being on the road for as many as 20 hours at a time. Some others have gone more than that. If there’s anything that makes it bearable, it’s possibly the fact that drivers stay together and try to help each other out wherever they can. They’re a close-knit group and they depend on that companionship to pull them through the roughest spots of their days. Also, many drivers enjoy relative in dependence with their work. “That means a lot,” says Brown. Russell Holllnger, a driver with 45 years of experience under his belt, hauls eggs for the R.W. Sauder firm of Lititz. Never in all his years of driving has he seen so much water in the country as he saw during the middle of this week. He drives anywhere from 130 to 230 miles per day, picking up as many as 900 cases of eggs. Behind the wheel of one of Sauder’s trucks for 25 years now, Bollinger also says that the past week or so has “been pretty tough on the nervous system.” There’s always tension, 'he says. What’s made it rough for - him and many others is the combination of ice and snow on the roads and thick fog all around. The mean conditions have stretched his working hours by more than a few in some cases. Bollinger’s supervisor, Paul Sauder, told Lancaster Farming that farm lanes often created the most dif ficulty since tire chains had to be installed and removed again once the truck is back on the highway. Sauder. picks up eggs within a 30-mile radius of Lititz and delivers them as far away as New York City and Washington, D.C. Ac cording to Sauder, 40 per cent of the streets in New York City weren’t plowed as of last Monday. That gave his deliverymen and him the biggest headache of all. The SHORT NOTICE SALE THURSDAY, FEB. 2,1978 12:30 P.M. AT SMOKETOWN QUALITY DAIRY SALE 5 Mi. E. of Lane., 5 Mi. W. of Intercourse, Rt. 340. SELLING TWO HERD OF COWS -1 out of Conn, and 1 out of Franklin County. 50 HEAD IN ALL Many of these cows are springers and fresh cows, milking 50 to 70 lbs. per day. 1 load cows out of New England States. 1 load of Holstein Heifers, Springing or fresh. There will be several purebreds plus 2 Red and White cows. SPECIAL MENTION: Selling a Sair Hill Elevator with over 17,000 milk with a 4.0% test. Also 1 Elevation Holstein Bull out of a Tidy Gent with over 26,000 milk and 999 lbs. fat in less than 1 year. Cows milked at regular time. TB and Blood Tested, Cash or good check night of sale. - SALE BY: Gordon W. Fritz 717-393-0930 Carl Oilier, Auctioneer Lunch by Bird-in-Hand Auxiliary transportation chief is quick to add, however, that his firm is “pretty fortunate - pretty lucky.” They had no accidents and were able to,^ keep the 'products moving.' “It takes good drivers to do that,” he commented. Like many of his counter parts in the milk hauling business, Hollinger found it impossible to be on the roads on Jan. 20. He says he caught up pretty well on Saturday. He’s one of 10 drivers employed by the Lititz egg handler. All things considered and summed up, Hollinger blames no one for some of the bad experiences he’s had to put up with. “We can’t blame the farmer for the conditions of some of their lanes, they’re busy too; and although some of the secon dary roads were in bad shape, we got through.” “It was just an situation,” he concluded.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers