Inside these mighty machines are farmers with families who love them. This wheat harvest season, we encourage sensible safety measures like the below.
1. Maintain Your Equipment’s Safety Features
Before your John Deere equipment hits the field for harvest time, ensure safety features are in proper working order. For example, grain carts can experience areas of decreased visibility. Make sure your grain cart’s turn signals and brake lights are working as they should before use.
Be sure to clean mirrors, reflectors and lights on things like grain carts, combines, gravity wagons and tractors regularly for optimal use. Accidents caused because the driver simply couldn’t see an approaching vehicle or other object are all too common. Give yourself every chance to avoid such incidents by taking care of the details.
2. Be Fire Ready
No one expects a fire to break out on the job. That’s why it’s important to always be prepared. Your local 21st Century Equipment location carries two types of fire extinguishers to help ensure you’re ready for harvest season. Visit us to purchase a John Deere ABC Dry Chemical Fire Extinguisher or a John Deere Water Fire Extinguisher for your farm today.
3. Operators Have Proper Training
Speaking of details, it’s important to ensure anyone operating your John Deere equipment this wheat harvest season has been properly trained on the basics. In the heat of the season when things are really busy, it can be easy to keep your nose to the grindstone and assume everyone feels confident about what they’re doing. Keep lines of communication open with your team and make sure everyone is following proper operating procedures.
4. Establish an Emergency Plan
An emergency communication plan is something you should always have, in the hopes you’ll never need it. For example, say it’s well past sundown and you haven’t heard from a certain driver on your team. Do you know which route they took? Which field they were headed to?
Once you have established guidelines for what to do in the case of an emergency, ensure your full team is aware of its details.
5. Pay Attention to Fatigue and Your Mental State
Taking care of yourself during this physically and mentally taxing time of year is key to overall safety. Long hours are the norm, and the stress that comes with harvest season is swept under the rug all too often. Be mindful of your own mental state as well as that of your co-workers, and even your family, during what can feel like a long marathon for everyone.
Fatigue can motivate you to take shortcuts that may be unsafe. Don’t rely on caffeine or sheer willpower to get you through. Hydrate, feed your body nutritious food, ask for help when you need it and make rest a priority whenever possible.
6. Slow Down for Slow-Moving Traffic
This is a bonus tip for anyone outside of the farming community who may be reading this blog. We can’t overstate this enough: Slow down for slow-moving and/or oversized traffic. The person in the driver’s seat has no control over the max MPH at which a piece of equipment can safely move.
John Deere draper platforms and combines are so large because they have big jobs to do. Be patient, slow down and give your local farmer an appreciative wave rather than risking an accident or injury by being in a rush.
While this isn’t an extensive list, these are solid tips for ensuring you and those around you stay safe this wheat harvest season. Do you have a little farmer in your life? Don’t forget we offer John Deere toys for sale so they can get in on the wheat harvest fun too!
Is it time to expand or upgrade your fleet of John Deere equipment? Visit the 21st Century Equipment John Deere dealer location nearest you today!