Behind the experienced mechanizer Ivan Mikhnyuk lies not just one season of work on forage and grain harvesters. The land on which the man works is truly his native land, for he was born and raised here. On Wednesday, Ivan Ivanovich took the KVK‑800 forage harvester out onto a corn field in the Khutor Zhuka locality, where he was to master

The green mass has grown, but the ears, due to the dry and hot weather, are not as large as last year. This cannot but affect the nutritional value of the silage, noted the chief agronomist of the agricultural enterprise. Our task is to provide the cattle herd with feeds that will increase the productivity of the dairy herd and weight gain. To this end, we roll wet corn grain into polymer sleeves every year and store it there. Thus, last year 2,930 tons of grain were rolled. This year, we have 300 tons so far, but the work is gaining momentum. It is difficult to say today what kind of grain-stalk mixture we will get. But we try to work with full compliance with the technology so that this concentrated feed becomes a truly effective source of useful substances in the animals' diet.

In total, in "Zakozelsky," corn is planned to be harvested on an area of 650 hectares. Of these, almost 200 hectares are for Ivan Mikhnyuk to prepare a grain-stalk mixture for storage in a silage trench. This technology helps save costs on drying grain, which this year has to be harvested with high moisture content. For preparing the grain-stalk mixture, the grain moisture can be 40-45 percent. To dry and bring corn grain with such moisture to proper condition, the farm incurs significant costs for gas and electricity, and it takes no less than a day. The time saving is obvious when comparing this technology with preparing corn grain by rolling it into sleeves. If you can roll 100 tons of grain in a day, you can get up to 200 tons in the form of a grain-stalk mixture.

Preparing the grain-stalk mixture from corn at the "Zakozelsky Breeding Farm" was entrusted to the experienced machine operator Ivan Ivanovich Mikhnyuk.

A smaller number of people is involved in preparing the grain-stalk mixture. Two tractors driven by machine operators Evgeny Ivanovich Mikhevich and Evgeny Evgenyevich Rumachik managed to transport the chopped ears from the combine. They delivered the bright, sunlit mass to the "Litovsky" dairy farm, where a small trench with a capacity of about one and a half thousand tons was built specifically for the grain-stalk mixture. Compaction was carried out by the experienced machine operator Alexander Ivanovich Kobrinets on an "Amkodor-342" loader.

The quality of compaction of the grain-stalk mixture depends on the operator of the "Amkodor-342" loader, Alexander Ivanovich Kobrinets.

On the field in the Khutor Zhuka tract, alongside the forage harvester, a powerful Rossel'mash-2400 tractor with a deep ripper was operating. Farmers were hurrying to prepare the area for an above‑plan sowing of winter grains for green fodder. Mineral fertilizers were being applied to the soil. However, a rich source of nutrients for the future crop, where the grain‑straw mixture was being prepared, should become the leaf‑stalk mass of corn, which, when shredded, is scattered over the field behind the harvester and serves as an effective organic fertilizer.