Farm Toys and Tractors for Kids and Adults

I love living in farm country, from the wide open space,the friendly people, to even my commute to work in Omaha Nebraska every morning. I'm more likely to meet a tractor on the highway early in morning instead of "normal" city rush hour traffice.

During the fall combines and tractors roll across the fields harvesting corn and soybeans. It's a magnificent site and one I love looking forward to every year. There is a photo opportunity around every corner. Combines of every color, green, yellow, and red, with an occasional white trek across the horizon from early morning well into the evening.

The great beast eat up grain like a hungry animal as the farmers keep an eye on the clouds, the weather and rows ahead of them. Although I grew up in Connecticut with the oceans, beaches and waves I could never move back. I would miss the big sky country of Nebraska, the tractors, the farmers, and the people.

It seems every kid in the country has a set of John Deere toy tractors. In church I see toddlers under the pews playing make believe farmer on the carpet with their miniature combines and wagons and it warms my heart.

Even the babies have little John Deere outfits and blankets, it's easy to see what color tractors their Grandpa or Dad have at home. Gotta be a Deere, because Nothing Runs Like a Deere.

It's not unusual to hear farmers get into a heated discussion between Red and Green tractors. Just like pickup trucks has their Ford and Chevy fans farmers are passionate about the color of their tractors.

So if you see a little boy (or girl) playing with all red tractors you can count on her Daddy, or Grandfather sees red at home with all Case farm equipment.

This farmer doesn't seem to care about brand loyalty when it comes to tractors, he has a Case International combine and an John Deere tractor. I do get strange looks when I quickly pull off the side of the road to take pictures around harvest time. By now, most farmers have gotten used to me, but they really enjoy it when I drop off an 8x10 photo of them farming. Most don't even think of taking a picture of doing their every day work.

But I do, farmers feed the world, they work long hours, take all the risk with inputs, fuel and are genuine stewards of the land. Less than 0.05 cents of a loaf of bread goes to the wheat farmer who grew the wheat. We are the the richest country in the world when it comes to food production, and many people are so far removed from farming they don't know that the corn grown in these fields is the same corn found in their corn tortillas.

The Cadillac of combines now has to be the New Hollands, you didn't see too many of these in the fields in Eastern Nebraska until a few years ago. They are yellow, streamlined, have a new modern look and and a beast of a combine. The implement dealers have been pushing them hard the past few years. Don't know why, but I'm motivated to find out.

This was one of my opportune moments as I was driving home from work. The farmer was combining his corn on the outer edge of the field and I drove up ahead to get this shot. It came out so good I entered the photo in the local county fair, it won a purple ribbon

Some adults collect toy farm equipment, it's a big business with the John Deere implement dealers. The men are just crazy about they collectible tractors and will search long and far for a particular tractor or combine model. These don't leave their boxes and are highly sought after and prized.

The old grain trucks are faithful workhorses around the farm hauling the grain from the fields to the elevators, to cattle, and the bins at home. Most are from the 1950s but have been taken care of over the years and are full of character. This truck sits in an oat field during July.

Harvest isn't just in the fall, but throughout the summer months as wheat is harvest, hay is baled, oats are cut and then silage season starts. The work is never done for a farmer. Even in down time there is machinery repairs and maintenance. These combines aren't cheap, with many being over $250,000.

In the rural communities people wave as they pass each other by, it doesn't matter if you know them or not, it's just being friendly, so wave, say Hello.