Much like Willy Wonka, Derks has a secret he's ready to reveal, but his “factory” is a steel barn and his “treat” is made of hay.
Now in its 19th year, the area's What the Hay contest Sunday is growing faster than the alfalfa fields. Last year, some 5,000 people voted on whose bale art was the best.
“All the talk at the coffee shop is ‘how's your bale going?' I always say, ‘gosh, I haven't even thought about it,' ” Derks said with a grin.
Perhaps that's why he and other bale artists are skeptical when they hear reigning champion Clint Carr said he is too busy this year to make a bale. Last year, the Hobson rancher won the coveted People's Choice Award for sculpting square dancers out of hay that actually moved in a circle and do-si-doed.
Some artists paint on giant round bales or use square bales to form their ideas, while others stuff wire mesh with straw and then paint them. Derks' work is much like an alfalfa topiary, as he uses a water-glue paste to create his creatures.
Many of the pieces follow Western themes - Charl-hay Russell, pi-hay-neers and buf-hay-los all have made an appearance. Sometimes fictional characters come to life, such as Mick-hay Mouse, Ton-hay the Tiger and Snoop-hay.
“Some people try to get at what you're working on and I just tell them they'll have to wait,” said Traci Mikkelsen, who had a top contender last year with S-hay-nta Claus and his lovely wife.
Should anyone stop by to snoop, Derks' work is hidden in the barn, tucked behind a plastic Christmas tree. His daughter's is covered in a blue plastic tarp, and still more masterpi-hay-ces are concealed in the barn's shadows, awaiting their unveiling.
“Here, I'll let you peek,” Derks said, moving the Christmas tree. “But you can't write about this.”
Before sunrise Sunday, he and the dozen other farmers and ranchers living along Highways 541 and 239 between Windham, Utica and Hobson will roll out their cre-hay-tions to beat the buses and cars that begin driving by at 6 a.m.
The event started when Rod Mikkelsen placed a pair of stuffed pants and boots underneath a hay bale - just to get a rise out of his wife, Traci, and the neighbors.
The prank prompted Derks to make a primitive bale bull, with a man riding on top. So many people stopped to see it and get their picture taken with it that a deputy asked him to take it down because it caused a traffic hazard.
Now an official contest, What the Hay has grown beyond the families who live along the loop.
Retired teachers in Lewistown created a bale this year, and several classes of school children will park their projects on farms along the route. Relatives from Arizona and Florida come up to make bale art, often with a little flavor from their hometowns.
And there's no question that it draws - and stops - traffic.
Traci Mikkelsen estimates that between the busiest hours of 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., it can take drivers two hours to travel the 20 miles between Windham, Utica and Hobson.
Derks giggles as he recalls the year he hid in the shed a hundred yards away from his hay milk cow. When someone stopped, he'd yank a string to ring a bell dangling from the black and white cow's neck.
“I had to stop doing it because the traffic was backed up so much, but no one could figure out how I was doing it,” he said.
While Sunday is the bus-hay-est day, people snake through to see the bale art throughout the week, until the whipping winds force the artists to haul them inside.
Such fragile art often takes hours to assemble. Traci Mikkelsen figures she puts in 20 hours for even the simplest of bale art. Derks has been working on his entry for weeks.
Traci and Rod Mikkelsen usually hit upon their ideas while talking at the table. It typically starts with a clever title and then it's up to Traci to paint bales to illustrate the idea.
Derks, on the other hand, quickly assembles his scene - the metal legs of a chair are twisted into the form of a cow, or a toilet seat is the center of a giant dragonfly's mouth. Then, he scratches his head to come up with a title that includes the words “hay,” “bale” or “alfalfa.”
Often, people's ideas play off current events. Derks excitedly anticipates an Olympics-themed entry with a Bird's Nest made out of hay and Mic-hay-el Phelps swimming his way to gold through golden fields of wheat.
Perhaps we'll see Bale-rack Obama debating John Mc-Hay-in.
“There's just so much out there that they can do,” Derks said.
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