Harvest as ‘spotty’ as summer rain

By Mike Ford, The Delphos Herald
Published:  Saturday, October 24, 2009 (3 months, 2 weeks ago)
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After a dry summer, area soybean yields depend on where a given field is in its respective county. Rainfall was “spotty,” yielding a better harvest for some than expected while others are below average.
Van Wert County Extension Educator Andy Kleinschmidt explains the situation:
“Soybean yield is extremely variable this year. Farmers report yields from bushels per acre in the mid-30s to mid-60s. It seems to depend on rain — the northern portion of Van Wert County, especially the northeast portion, had more rain and are reporting more than 60 bpa. The southern portion of the county toward Mercer County is where rainfall was lacking; it was very dry throughout the year and those soybean yields aren’t as robust as northeast Van Wert County,” he said.
The Putnam County Extension educator reports similar yields.
“It’s going to be below average because of the dry weather; it looks like about 39 or 40 bushels per acre and we usually have about 44 bpa in a normal year. Fort Jennings and Ottoville were among the driest areas of the county and Kalida was pretty dry also, as was Pandora but Continental and Miller City should have a good year,” Glen Arnold said.
As for corn, it is too early to forecast yield but Kleinschmidt thinks soybean yields will reflect rainfalls that will entrain a similar corn harvest.
“We haven’t harvested enough corn to know what yields will be but some areas may be very good. Areas that had good soybean yields will likely also have good corn yields but where rain was lacking, it will probably be depressed,” he said.
Arnold says only five percent has been harvested so far but expects corn to be hit harder than soybeans were.
“We think the corn crop will be harder hit by the dry weather than soybeans were. We’ve only harvested five percent at best but it’s wet. Some areas of the county are at 25 percent moisture and others are down around 20 percent. Farmers are reluctant to harvest it and are holding off as long as we don’t get heavy rain. They’re watching the forecast and hoping their corn will naturally dry down a bit,” he said.
Kleinschmidt explains why corn is too moist:
“It seems counter-intuitive to have wet corn after drought conditions but we had a cool summer. Even though it was dry, it wasn’t hot enough for corn to naturally dry down to 18 percent moisture. We need a lot of moisture in June, July and August but in September and October, we like to have some dry, warmer days to naturally dry the crop. We didn’t have the right conditions, so we’re ranging from the mid-20s to low-30s in moisture,” he said.

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