Blogs

As soybean plants mature, leaves drop and stems lose their green color. But "green stem syndrome” can prevent the stems from drying down properly and cause the stems to remain green after seeds are mature. Occasionally, green leaves also remain. The green stems are tough, hard to cut, and more likely to plug the combine. It is a natural inclination to wait until the stems lose this green color before harvesting. But harvest should proceed if seed moisture is 13% or lower; as seed quality may suffer, shatter losses will increase, and seed moisture will continue to decrease.

For the most part harvest is underway in eastern Iowa. Yields are what we expected - all over the board. The major difference from being pleasantly surprised and disappointed comes down to if the field received any measurable rain in the month of June. Most areas received a tenth or two, but I am talking about areas that received 2 plus inches in June. These areas seem to be pulling out some decent yields.

Corn harvest should be in full swing by the end of this week across most of the region.  Dry Land corn harvest has progressed very rapidly.  Most dry land corn has been chopped for silage and what corn was left to pick is coming out quickly.  High Moisture Corn has been going on for about the last ten days.  High temps have brought moistures down very quickly.  There will be a lot of irrigated corn in the 18% moisture range by the middle to end of this week.  Some of the best irrigated corn that I have heard harvested so far was in the Central Nebraska area.

Harvest began several weeks early when some producers started to harvest corn in mid to late August.  Yields have varied widely across western Iowa and Missouri.  Comments have been made that yield monitors are showing yield variations across a field from 0 to 200+ yields with field averages ranging from 0 to 200 bushel.  Higher yield levels have been in areas that received timely rain this year, but more importantly, they went into the year with more moisture in the soil profile.   Lower yields have been in areas that went into the year with limited soil reserve

Corn harvest is in full swing and even complete in much of Southern IL and Missouri.  I think most knew that yields were going to be down before harvest started, but most discovered lower than expected yields once the combines hit the field.  Estimating the final yield for the U.S., State, or even county is going to be a challenge because of the extreme variation.  We’ve seen combine monitors in one pass through the field hit 0-200+ bushels per acre this year.  A good portion of the area has been between 50-100 bushels per acre.  Problems that we’ve b

Harvest continues/begins this week in Ohio.  Some elevators were offering reduced drying charges which encouraged corn harvest on some operations.  There is more ear mold and sprouted kernels than many people expected, but so far not enough to be alarmed about.  Corn yields I have heard about have ranged from 10-200 bpa.  Severe fields are in the 10-70 range.  Corn moisture is in the 19-30%+ range for most fields.

Harvest is moving along fairly quickly in Northern Illinois.  Adwell elevator, which has locations in Tremont, Morton and South Pekin reported last Friday that the corn crop in those areas is over 65% harvested.  Corn in general is doing a little better than we expected even in those drought stricken areas.  A couple of months ago a lot of farmers were thinking they would be lucky to get a 60-80 bushel corn crop.  Yields coming in from those areas have been surprisingly 30-40 bushel more than expected.  Where we were fortunate to catch rain, the corn is really go

Corn harvest is well under way in the Plains East Region.  As expected, yields have been all over the board.  In the areas of severe drought, dryland field yields are 0-10 bu.  Many of these acres were cut for silage.  The range in tons per acre were 6-8 ton per acre. 

Corn harvest is almost complete in mid-south, well on the way in southern Indiana-Kentucky and beginning in the north. Yields are as expected. Irrigated fields in SW Missouri and Arkansas are producing 180-220 bushels per acre. Farms in southern Indiana and Kentucky are in the 30-80 bushel per acre range. There is an occasional 120-150 bushel yield where a timely rain occurred in July. Yields will vary from 0-30 on high ground and perhaps 100 or more in lower fertile ground. North and east central Indiana was also affected by extreme drought this summer.

Harvest is now underway for parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin. Above normal temperatures and GDU accumulation through the summer compounded with dry conditions pushed harvest several weeks ahead of schedule and has this area off to one of the earliest starts in decades. Rain showers moved through on Wednesday and slowed combines but the weekend looks to be favorable for good harvest conditions.