Day one of the conference..

This year's Women in Sustainable Agriculture Conference was held in beautiful State College, PA.   I flew up from SC along with my friends and fellow farmers, Stacy and Rebecca, who I met throught the Clemson New and Beginning Farmer Program.  We joined the conference in order to show support for Jennifer Boyles of Clemson who is creating SC WAgN; a Women's Agricultural Network for South Carolina.  We decided to divide and conquer, by choosing different workshops to attend and then to blog about our experiences and what we learned, so here's my story!

Day one was a tough choice!  We had the opportunity to go on two different farms tours in the beautiful Amish country of PA, with meals and beverages included or we could attend an intensive learning clinic on Tractor Operation and Maintenance.  As much as I love a farm tour, I chose the clinic,  as I may need to purchase a tractor soon, and certainly need to learn how to drive one and change out implements, etc. I've been hoping to attend a tractor  class locally for months now and so I jumped at this learning opportunity.

The class was led by four gentleman associated with the Ag Safety and Health Program out of Penn State.  These fellas, as they joke, have over 100 years of collective experience in this field and were patient and thorough instructors.

We began with an introduction to tractors from the center of gravity of a tractor and common mistakes that lead to accidents to learning and labeling the different parts; gears, filters and the engine in general.  We looked at the body of the tractor and were given handouts listing what to look for and what questions to ask when looking to purchase a used tractor.  This information was invaluable, especially knowing that after 8000 hours of operation, a tractor will start to act up/ depreciate quickly-" least cost life" and that after 12,000 hours is it's "worn out life"..  We learned how to check the oil, change filters, grease gears and approach the tractor safely.  These guys definitely focused on safety at all times.

We were then split into groups and were able to drive 3 different models and sizes of tractor.  Switching gears, running a course and backing up to attach a hitch.  I loved it!!  I was a little intimidated by the largest tractor at first, but I was the first to volunteer to drive it.  Even though I kept the gear in turtle speed ( not rabbit!), I found that I was very comfortable up there and felt confident driving and backing up.  Finally, we moved on to the third tractor where we focused on safely hitching implements to drawbars and a 3 pt mount and safely detaching them.

I was very impressed by this clinic and walked away feeling that I could drive a tractor safely and that I could change out the implements and do basic maintenance onthe machine by myself.  Awesome!

Learning to drive the big rig

Driving Instructions

Driving the course

Practicing backing up