My eyes drift across the coloured zones on the screen again as I move to shift the tractor back into gear, but I pause when my gaze lands on the section I’m sitting in right now. A long stretchof blue runs along the entire border where this field meets the hollow heart field.
That’s… interesting.
I lean forward to try to make sense of what this prescription is doing. It looks like the system is lowering the seeding rate through this stretch because the soil here holds more moisture. Which is what I’ve always noticed when I worked this field. The planter drags harder along this edge, the soil is generally a bit slower to warm in the spring, and it typically breaks into heavier clods. Which is different from the rest of the field. And fields often have sections like this.
But what’s interesting is that it’s actually quite similar to the middle section of the hollow heart field.
I turn to look at it, letting my gaze sweep over the large, open space. It would make sense if this zone expands into the field, since I’ve noticed the soil responds similarly along the middle strip.
But… then why have we never had hollow heart inthiszone inthisfield?
I look to the far edge of the hollow heart field, where it borders the long dirt road that leads down to the beach. That stretch always dries out faster than the rest of the field, since the wind pulls moisture out of the soil before irrigation can keep up. Water runs off quicker there, too, and anything planted along that edge always seems to push ahead faster than the rest.
Then I shift my focus towards the far side along the tree line. That section is the complete opposite. It stays cooler longer into the season because of the shade, and the ground holds moisture longer. Tree roots also creep into the field, pulling nutrients and water before the crop gets at them.
And the section closest to the beach also responds differently. The sandier ground there drains in a completely different way, and it gets more wind than any part of anyfield. That whole side responds differently to irrigation, always needing to be managed a little more just to keep it even with the rest.
And the middle part of the field is its own zone. And it’s a large one.
Colours begin to spread across the field in my mind as I trace each zone with my eyes, the way they show on the map in the cab. Each one reaches towards the centre of the field, overlapping and stacking on top of each other. The fast-drying ground from the roadside, the cooler, heavier soil along the trees, and the wind and drainage pulling from the beach side.
And suddenly the picture in my head shifts.
Those issues aren’t stopping at the edges. They’re all pushing in towards the middle.
All these zones are overlapping in the middle of the field.
Each zone has its own stressor. And on their own, they don’t produce hollow heart.
But when they’re all stacked together like that strip down the middle… they could. Especially in the wrong kind of season.
A colder spring when the soil takes longer to warm up, heavy rain that shifts where the moisture sits, wind drying one side faster than the other, irrigation trying to even it out… My eyes quickly move over the field as my thoughts start moving so fast, I can barely keep up. There are too many things going on in the same section of this field.
And when the conditions line up just wrong, the plants there would go from slow growth to fast growth too quickly. Which is when hollow heart shows up.
If this is true, the inconsistency finally makes sense. All the stressors are always there, pressing in from every side. It’s just that some seasons push that middle strip over the edge, and some don’t.
It’s thatzonethat’s unpredictable. And because it runs through the middle of the field, it makes the whole thing look unreliable.
Holy shit.
I need to find Levi.
THIRTY-FIVE
“Canyou show me the zones for the hollow heart field?”
My head snaps up from my computer, and my eyes widen when I see Silas standing in the doorway of my office. For a moment all I can do is stare at him, frozen in place while my brain—which has been running nonstop with thoughts of him since last night—suddenly decides to stop working completely.
“What?” is all I manage to say.
He steps into my office, and my heart thrashes as he approaches my desk.
I’ve been stressing all night and all morning about what it means that I kissed him, and I didnotexpect to see him today at all. Especially not here in my office.
He’s never come to my office before.
And he came here after I kissed him.
