Crop Comments

Use this link to send us your comments (or e-mail CropComments@agweb.com) about the crops in your local area. Be sure to send us your photos and videos! Comments will be edited for brevity and clarity. (Please keep your comments crop-related.

Here's a sampling of what some folks are saying: 

• 1/27 - Allen County, Kan.: We have had a total of 25 inches of snow this winter. Should be way above 100 inches by now. What we had is all gone now and back to green grass again. Last night we had about 2 inches of rain, we might end up being thankful for that if this weather pattern stays this way into spring.
  
  

• 1/27 - Allen County, Kan.: Lots of early anhydrous application going on right now. Some of us have taken advantage of completing chisel work in some fields. The wheat is beginning to show signs of damage as it is turning yellow. Lack of moisture and too much warm temps - the crop doesn't know what to do right now. Have not had any significant moisture since November which helped to fill the ponds back. There was a steady action of ponds being dug out in the area as a major majority had gone dry due to the extensive heat last summer. Have a good one. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
• 1/27 - Northern Kentucky: Here is a video of fall tillage from 2011 with our John Deere 8235R, Great Plains Turbo-Till, Brillion zone commander and M&W Earthmaster. The tractor is steered on John Deere SF-1 auto-trac. Video courtesy of schwenkebrothers’ YouTube channel.
  

• 1/26 - Wood County, Ohio: Finally finished harvest on Jan. 20. Corn was planted June 10 and yielded 195 bu/ac dry corn, proving once again it’s not the date you plant. It’s what the weather and rainfall is during the growing season.
   
• 1/26 - Texas: Thanks to rains, more of Texas transitioned from exceptional to extreme drought, or from severe to moderate, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. But weekly on-the-ground reports from Texas AgriLife Extension Service agents still paint a mixed picture of the general agricultural situation. In Deaf Smith County, the Panhandle, Rick Auckerman, AgriLife Extension agent, reported that producers are revisiting planting grain sorghum instead of corn. Cotton plans are mixed, but generally plantings are expected to be up this year, but a lot will depend upon whether the area gets spring rains before planting. "Where’s the rain?" asked Kevin Brendle, AgriLife Extension agent Dickens County, east of Lubbock. "We had drier, windy and warmer conditions most of the week. Cotton land is being prepared and readied for spring planting."

• 1/19 - McLeod County, Minn.: This is by far and away the craziest weather I have ever seen. Last spring was so wet we didn’t get planted until the first part of June. Torrential rains continued into the first part of August. Then the heat took over and cooked the ground for the rest of the year. After planting we were certain we would combine thirty percent corn, but we ran it straight into the bin and got done in record time with a HOT October. We ripped the ground as deep as we could, but Mother Nature won. All the soil in Southern MN is so compacted and clodded up. I don’t see any way we raise a good crop next year. We have had about three inches of snow. This time last year we had over 50" already. We have gone from one extreme to another and it is looking like a real disaster.
  
  

  I averaged 24bu beans for my farm and I don’t know anybody that really broke 30 on average. Corn for the most part was 120-140. There are no corn piles from here all the way to SW MN. Don’t really know where it all is, but there is none out there.

• 1/19 - Central Missouri: I was digging a Fallen big oak tree stump near a branch, good black soil 4.5 feet deep DUST!!! In the bottom of the hole, Trend Line Corn 2012?? Wheat is suffering with no snow cover and one day 60 the next 15 with 30mph wind. God Help Us.
  
   
• 1/19 - Texas: Winter rain accumulations varied across the state, from as much as 5 inches in some East Texas counties to 1 inch to 3 inches in Central and North Texas, according to reports from Texas AgriLife Extension Service personnel.Parts of the Rolling Plains also got rain, as much as 1.5 inches, while some areas in West Central Texas got more than 1 inch, according to reports by AgriLife Extension county agents. The rest of the state remained mostly dry, receiving only light rains if any. Where there was rain, winter forages and wheat benefited, and stock tanks and ponds were replenished to varying degrees.
  

  Rains greened up winter pastures in many parts of the state, such as in this Rusk County field, and encouraged producers to apply fertilizer. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Robert Burns) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 1/19 - O’brien County, northwest Iowa: I've had maybe 5 tenths of moisture the last 6 1/2 months. Did a little tiling this fall through a mud hole- bone dry. No subsoil moisture to go on.
  
   
• 1/19 - Western Iowa: Information from Joel DeJong, field agronomist, ISU Extension and Wayne Roush, farm superintendent, ISU Research and Demonstration Farms: Fall anhydrous applications were not hampered by too much water, instead some producers chose not to apply anhydrous because soil conditions were too dry and anhydrous was not sealing well in the soil in some fields.
  
  "Fall subsoil moisture samples taken at the Western Research and Demonstration Farm for Iowa State University showed there was no water left in the 5 foot soil profile. Crops were sustained in 2011 by the water stored in the soil, but all reserves were used. Significant recharge is needed by the time corn and soybeans are planted in 2012.  (ISU Western R & D Farm is located in Monona County, Iowa near the town of Castana.)

• 1/12 - Greene, Iowa: We’re very dry.
  
   
• 1/12 - Gray County, Kan.: Our soil moisture profile needs about 8 inches of rain. Ten inches would not be unwelcome.
• 1/12 - Livingston County, Ill.: I planted a few acres of wheat for 2012. This means I will have about a 50% corn and 50% beans with the rest of my acres. We've had good rains and the soil profile is about full.
  
   
• 1/12 - Gray County, Kan.: We’ve had 2 inches of moisture since May! Our subsoil moisture is zero!
  
   
• 1/12 - Murray County, Minn.: An excavator buried a hog pit last week. Dug a hole eighteen feet deep with dry clay in the bottom of the hole. Not much moisture for the corn roots to seek out this summer!
• 1/12 - Polk County, Minn.: The moisture levels are as low as I have ever seen them-my alfalfa fields might be gone with little or no snow cover.
  
   
• 1/12 - Redwood County, Minn.: Stopped raining here July 19. We received about 1.5 inches since and are about 8 inches behind normal. It’s dry down 6 feet. Southern half of Minnesota is in severe drought.
• 1/12 - Keota, Iowa: We have no moisture at this time.
  
   
• 1/12 - Logan County, Ark.: Here in west-central Arkansas we are wet at this time. We came out of a severe drought in 2011-- it started raining in October and has stayed wet since. We’ve had 22 to 26 inches since that time wheat is showing its effect starting to turn yellow. In low spots it is dying. We need a few sunny days to correct it. It will probably go the other way when it does.
  
   
• 1/12 - Shelby County, Ill.: Weather is unusually mild so far! Some tiles started running in late DEC! As far as crops to plant in 2012. I retired as of harvest 2011!!

• 1/11 - Clark County, Wis.: We’ve had very warm January and December. No snow and our precipitation has been very low -- less than a 1 inch. Wheat looks very poor. I don’t think it will make it. Our hay crop is also not looking good.
  
   
• 1/11 - Cayuga County, N.Y.: Grass is still green. Close to 100 inches of snow this time last winter. Normal season for us about 140 inches.
• 1/11 - East central Iowa: Trying to haul corn before snow hits. Sounds like we may actually get 1-4 inches Wednesday – Thursday. It has been extremely nice without snow (easy to get around, not hauling snow out of cattle yards, no tractor or skid loader chains). We reached 50-55 F and sunny Tuesday here, but it is supposed to cool off. Bad thing is that if the snow comes first, the ground will not freeze hard. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 1/11 - Texas: Many areas received rain, but the general consensus from weekly reports by Texas AgriLife Extension Service county agents was that more is needed to keep wheat and winter pastures going. The U.S. Drought Monitor backs up these observations. As of Jan. 3, the monitor still showed nearly 70 percent of the state as being under severe to extreme drought. However, this is an improvement over the situation at the beginning of October when 97 percent of the state was under severe to extreme drought.
  

  In some parts of the state, December and January rains meant winter pastures that were planted on time could already be grazed, but most producers were still having to feed hay. (Texas AgriLife Research photo by Dr. Monte Rouquette) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 1/11 - Henry County, Ohio: Still some corn in field. Hoping cold weather arrives end of the week before the snow does. So I can finish. Very little fall tillage done this fall. Unless you call the ruts made tillage. We will need a good spring to get fields in shape for planting.

• 1/9 - Caldwell County, Mo.: What a great winter we are having. Neighbors are putting on NH3 -- not too many winters could you do this!
  
   
• 1/9 - Summit County, Ohio: There is still corn out in the fields, me included, although it is only about 15 or so acres. It has been so wet and the lack of cold has kept the remaining corn in the fields. There is not a whole lot out, but still way more than I have ever seen. I have seen very little fall tillage, if any, too. I hope to try and get the rest of the corn in this week if the damn rain holds off long enough to dry out a bit. I can't believe this season will not end.
  
   
• 1/9 - Wharton, Texas: Extremely dry here in south Texas, with zero subsoil moisture. We finally got 2" of rain in December, the first since rain since May. Might not have any dryland corn unless we can get 6"-10" of rain before planting. That is getting less likely every day, since we start planting corn around Feb. 20.
   
• 1/9 - Chickasaw County, Iowa: This is our annual movie for 2011. We’re loving the mild weather. We are a 1,400-acre row crop operation in northeast Iowa. We also produce 10,000 head of hogs annually. Follow us at www.lantzkyfarms.com.
  

• 1/6 - DeKalb County, Ala.: Wheat looks good. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   
• 1/6 - Logan County, Ill.: We will grow 275 acres soybeans and 73 acres corn.
  
   
• 1/6 - Nobles County, Minn.: DRY! We have not had significant moisture since JULY! We are extremely dry! Our ground is hard as cement. Everyone around here is giddy because we are not walking around in waist high snow like we usually are this time of year. But I am concerned that there is no sign of change in the weather pattern soooo, no chance of rain/snow anytime soon. We had just better hope we have a wet March/April or we are in big trouble!

• 1/5 - East central Iowa: I was loading corn out of shed. No snow yet (can you tell I'm excited). Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 1/5 - Texas: A Texas AgriLife Extension Service economist advised Texas cotton producers to consider selling sooner rather than later – assuming they have a decent offer. "The market is saying not to wait for higher prices," said Dr. John Robinson, AgriLife Extension cotton economist. "I would say that if somebody has a fairly decent contract, I would be looking to sell on any rally." Most Texas cotton has been harvested, and much is sitting in warehouses waiting to be sold, Robinson said.
  

  "If you’ve got cotton now, I sure wouldn’t hold it a long period of time," said a Texas AgriLife Extension Service cotton marketing expert. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Whit Weems) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 1/3 - Caldwell County, Mo.: We traded planters the last day of the year, got a 6-row. I was going to have to hire a neighbor to plant my corn, so with the savings from hiring work done and the tax break, it will soon pay for itself! 
  
   
• 1/3 - East central Iowa: Picture is from Dec. 2, when I was squeezing in the last load of corn. No snow yet (excellent!). Us not having snow is saving everyone a lot of money (no labor, wear and tear, fuel, hauling manure -- not snow, etc.) It is supposed to get down to 8°F Monday night and then warm up again. Hopefully the ground freezes hard enough to alleviate some compaction.
  

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 1/3 - Sparta, Mich.: Check out this harvest video from 2011. Video courtesy of agsalesman’s YouTube Channel.
  

Use this link to send us your comments (or e-mail CropComments@agweb.com) about the crops in your local area. Be sure to send us your photos and videos! Comments will be edited for brevity and clarity. (Please keep your comments crop-related.

Here's a sampling of what some folks are saying: 

• 12/29 - Norman County, Minn.: Not a speck of snow here on 12-28-11. We went into the winter very dry. I do not think we have had 1/2 inch of precipitation since August. We need some moisture to get anything to grow in the spring.
  
  
• 12/28 - Northeast Nebraska: Good crops this year but very dry now. We’ve not had a good rain since the middle of August.
  
   
• 12/28 - Spink County, S.D.: Weather has been great all fall in SD. We have done many jobs that have been on the back burner for several years including tiling ground the week before Christmas. 40 bu. beans and 150ish corn this year were good for how wet it was early on.
  
   
• 12/28 - Cayuga County, N.Y.: We live 20 miles west of Syracuse. Last year this time 80 inches of snow 200 inches for season. This year no snow for Christmas and 0.7 for season so far.
   

• 12/28 - Lorette, Manitoba, Canada: Here’s a video of our 2011 harvest season. Video courtesy of raynaudfarms1’s YouTube channel.
  

• 12/23 - Lancaster County, Pa.: I am thankful but ready to put 2011 to bed. Rainfall here in Lancaster County exceeded 6 feet, normal rainfall is 40-44 inches and we have had in excess of 72 inches YTD. I was only able to sell 50 % of soybean crop. The remaining crop, primarily the full season beans are unmarketable, except at a severe discount. We will feed them to our cattle and not purchase DDG’s. The analysis shows normal to above normal fat and protein, but the beans are shriveled and mostly purple in color… just not expectable to the markets in this area. Double crop beans after wheat and barley were in the 50-55 bpa range.

  Corn yields were disappointing, between 125-150, but basis is at least +$1.00, so the poorest corn sales to date are all +$7.00 delivered less than 10 miles.

  Cattle feeding margins are strong as the packer is offering contracts at + basis for deferred cattle later in the year. I can lock in market price for my feed plus $100 head. Hope rains eternal… there is always next year.

  Family is healthy and all close home, living within 1 mile and employed in ag related careers they enjoy. A healthy 17 month grandchild to celebrate Christmas this year and another one on the way is a blessing. Thank you Jesus.
   

• 12/22 - Western Walsh County, northeast North Dakota: Just a week till Christmas and no snow yet. I'm loving this brown landscape! Temp was 51°F in Grand Forks yesterday! The ice fishermen are the only ones complaining about the weather. Lots of seed shopping going on. Certified barley seed is very hard to find. The best varieties of hard red spring wheat have been selling well. We have been looking to contract new crop edible beans, but the local processors are not getting commitments from their canning customers very quickly...so it becomes a waiting game.
  
   
• 12/22 - Henry County, Ohio: It is officially the wettest year since records have been kept with today's rainfall. Well over 48 inches. 16 inches more than normal. Still some standing corn and beans in county, which is standing in water.
  
   
• 12/22 - East central Iowa: Weather has been great here. No snow yet. Temps in the low 30s during the day and 20s during the night. This is opposite of last year at this time. I think we had 2-3 snowstorms and a lot colder temps. Roads have been perfect for getting corn to town. Video is of 8th day after startup. Cows are adapting extremely well. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 12/19 - Wilbur, Wash.: To say it's dry in the inland Northwest is an understatement. Record-setting lack of moisture. Along Highway 2, rainfall since July 1 totals less than 2 inches. Planted winter wheat stands look good so far and there is good subsoil moisture. As always, without good rains in May-June the subsoil moisture doesn't do much good. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
• 12/19 - Southern Hancock County, Ohio: On Dec. 10, we finally got our corn 150 bu. with 23 & 24 moisture. Mold and cracks. Also took off the beans we couldn't get to until the ground froze. Their moisture was 21. Had to find an elevator that would take them. The combine driver commented that it was odd taking corn and beans off while looking at Christmas lights. Thank God we are finally finished for this year. Merry Christmas to all!
   
• 12/16 - McIntosh County, N.D: Corn crop was above average, hilltops were better than low areas due to excess moisture in July. Not much precip since mid Sept. Topsoil is dry, no snow. We may not have a white Christmas.
   

• 12/14 - East central Iowa: Focus has shifted to starting two Lely robotic milk machines. Weather is perfect, no snow, not cold, temps in the 30s to mid 40s. Extended forecast has no threatening weather in it for now.
  

• 12/13 - LaMoure County, N.D.: Fall 2011 was dry, the best harvest conditions ever had. Lots of fall tillage. We're ready for more corn acres for 2012. Thanks for good 85-day hybrid corn seed.
  
   
• 12/13 - Benton/Warren counties, Ind.: Crops were very good in our area, although you didn't have to go far west to get into some areas that were severely impacted by hot, dry weather. Our corn averaged 185 bpa with beans at 55 bpa. Not close to our best, but still very satisfactory results. All NH3 applied except about 60 acres we would like to have finished, but we'll be in good shape for spring.
  
   
• 12/13 - Caldwell County, Mo.: We are planting 40% corn and 60% beans and no-tilling 80% of the beans.

• 12/12 - Stutsman County, N.D.: Our 2011 crop was horrid, with drowned-out spots from excessive precipitation. For 2012, we will plant 40% corn acres and 60% soybean acres on our eastern North Dakota farm. No wheat will be planted. This will be a first "no wheat" year since homesteading in 1888.
  
   
• 12/12 - Barber County, Kan.: 95% of wheat has emerged in our area. We have been blessed with some recent rains to put us at 50%-75% of annual rainfall. We need another 6"-8" of moisture to reach last year's wheat yield potential. There is very little wheat pasture for cattle. Row crop bookings (under irrigation) have all been reported as short season corn or low population/full maturity for next year. No beans have been booked for next year's planting intentions. No dryland corn or dryland beans have been booked due to lack of subsoil moisture. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)    
  
   
• 12/12 - East central Iowa: This video was taken Dec.7. The ground was frozen 2" in some spots (15°F Tuesday night). We got down to 6°F Saturday morning, so it's safe to say that fall work has come to an end. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  

• 12/7 - Buffalo County, Neb.: Just returned from Dayton, Ohio via Indianapolis, Peoria, and across Iowa on Hwy 34. Where are all the no-till fields I read about in the farm mags? It looks like the whole Corn Belt has been fall farmed! I see some NH3 still being applied, but that probably has come to a screeching halt as it's 12 below zero this a.m. here in central Nebraska. Most of the fall work has been done in this area. Our soybean yields averaged 81 bu. this fall, but corn yields were generally 20-25 bu. below average, mainly because of the terrific windstorm on July 10. Most fields damaged from 5%-90%. Our corn yielded 177 bu. average. Not good. I have done a cash flow for next season and need $4.17 @ 190 bu. for a break-even. We have decided on 60-40 corn-bean for next year, which is a few more bean acres than usual. Also, we will not be using any Roundup on corn this year. Happy holidays!
  
   
• 12/7 - East central Iowa: We’ve been doing a little fall ripping. Videos courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
  
   
• 12/7 - Mercer County, northwestern Illinois: We had a good safe harvest in western Illinois.  Corn yields were variable, from good to very poor. Beans very good.
  

  -- Mercer County, northwestern Illinois (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 12/5 - Henry County, Ohio: Another 1½" in rain guage this morning. Very close to 25" since Sept. 1. I can still see corn standing every direction I look. Also know where several fields of soybeans are standing. Like my two-year-old daughter says, A BIG MESS!
  
   
• 12/5 - Dallam County, Texas: Finished corn on Monday. Yields where either good or bad. Wheat needs rain or snow. Glad to get this year over with. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)    
  
   
• 12/5 - Summit County, Ohio: The rains have kept a lot of us out of the fields as of late. I personally still have a 30-acre field of corn yet to go and a 35-acre field of beans still out.  These two fields are so wet that I will now have to wait until the ground freezes to get in. I have decided to call the landowner on the corn field and ask about their long-term plans with the ground. If it is going to remain as is, I am going to look into subsurface drainage. A bit of a risk on rented ground, but all in all, it is really nice ground. I was down in Stark County on Wednesday, and I saw a lot of corn and beans still out. This has been our worst fall and spring in many years.
  

  -- Summit County, Ohio (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 12/5 - Lebanon, Ind.: Harvest at Herr Farms. Everything went great until our last field. Slip clutch went on the corn head and had to borrow a neighbor’s corn head, so that’s why we're running a plastic corn head at the end of the video. Video courtesy of 8300JohnDeere's YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 12/5 - East central Iowa: See the last few videos from our 2011 harvest. These last fields are severely goosenecked, but it could be much worse. Videos courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
  
  
  
   

Use this link to send us your comments (or e-mail CropComments@agweb.com) about the crops in your local area. Be sure to send us your photos and videos! Comments will be edited for brevity and clarity. (Please keep your comments crop-related.

Here's a sampling of what some folks are saying: 

• 11/30 - Texas: Cold fronts brought rain, from a trace to 2" or more, to much of the state during the last week, according to Texas AgriLife Extension Service personnel. As usual, when it comes to weather, there were winners and losers. East Texas, North Texas, Central Texas and the Rolling Plains were the main beneficiaries, with the Coastal Bend, South Texas and Far West Texas regions largely passed over, while the Panhandle and South Plains regions fell in between these extremes, according to weekly reports by AgriLife Extension county agents. Where rain fell, cool-season grasses and winter wheat benefited, though the consensus, even where 2" or more fell, was that much more rain was needed to keep winter forages going.
  

  In the Panhandle, producers were working around rain to get cotton stripped and into modules. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo.) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 11/30 - Logan and Menard counties, Illinois: William shows the depth of the paraplow for vertical tillage for no-till fields. Video courtesy of http://farmandranchcountry.com.
  
  
   
• 11/30 - East central Iowa: This is the second-to-last field we have. Videos courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
  
   

• 11/29 - Roane County, Tenn.: Rain, rain! Hoping the ground will dry out enough to finish fall tilling. Corn went well this year, soybeans average to above. Maybe if we get a little wind the next few days, we can finish plowing before the next rain.
  
   
• 11/29 - West central Ohio: It has been a very unusual year for weather.
  April: Over 8.5" of rain
  May: 6.78", soil was very wet. We were able to plant on the 12th and 13th on well-drained soil only.
  June: 4.08" by June 21 -- started planting on the 3rd
  July: 1.71", very hot and was tough on corn pollination
  August: 2.32", very hot, tough on corn pollination
  September: 7.38", rained 21 out of the 30 days -- little drydown on corn
  October: 3.36", soil very wet again -- could not park any trucks or wagons in fields to harvest
  November: 4.13" by Nov. 27 and predicting heavy rain the next three days.
  There’s still about 15% of corn in fields. Soil will have to freeze before any more harvesting can be done. Grain moisture is still around 25%. Test plots ranged from 118 bu./acre down to 92. Corn yields are down about 40% and soybeans down about 30%. It has been a very trying and stressful year. Unlike some areas in the South, we at least will have subsoil moisture to work with next year! If this continues, we may have trouble with ducks and geese in 2012. Have a safe, happy and blessed holiday season! 
   

• 11/29 - Crooks, S.D.: I'm happy I got my grandpa in a video. He started our operation with horses and a plow. It’s such a neat thing to still have him around and get to experience the many changes in agriculture he has got to see over 80+ years. We had a bountiful harvest this year and it almost went too fast! :) We got done on Oct. 27. Video courtesy of therealfarmgirl’s YouTube channel.
  

• 11/28 - Clark County, Wis.: Crops of corn beans were very good, 175 bu corn 55 bu beans. All work is done. Fertilizer is being spread. We have all fertilizer spread on our farm. Seed corn and bean seed are purchased for 2012.
  
   
• 11/28 - West central Illinois: Crops were better than last year. Corn avg. for me was low 190's. Beans avg. was 62. Started selling corn last year at $5.07 then some at $5.45 then $6.50 then$ 6.75 never hit $7. Harvest came and price fell. Hope to get over $6 for the rest. In my position you have to start selling when you think it’s profitable at the time.
  
   

• 11/28 - Fulton/Miami counties, Indiana: We are wet, wet, W*E*T! Many of my neighbors are finished with 2011. Some have not. I've said since 2009 that if we saw another 2009 it'd be too soon. So here we are...it's too soon! Too much corn at or near 25% to dry and store. Too much combine and not enough drying cap. That's the bad side. The good side is we are very near or slightly above our 5 year average in yield on corn. Soybeans in our area didn't fair so well. Our total farm average was 40.8 BPA. Our APH on beans is in the mid to high 40's. If we can get it in the bin, our overall average on corn will be at or near 170, which is really good for us. We didn't plant the first grain of corn until June 3rd. It missed the hot weather at pollination time and that's what saved us. We had enough heat units to get it to black layer. Quality is very good with TW running in the low 60's. Can't complain too much just would like to get this behind us. Planted some wheat on October 30 it is up and looks really pretty good. Not ideal soil conditions to plant wheat. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  
   
• 11/28 - East central Iowa: Tried not to work on Thanksgiving (didn't happen). It took 2 1/2 hours to finish. The plan was to have a friend finish this field thanksgiving morning (he offered), but fog didn't leave until noon. I am renting disk chisel from a friend who needs it today (Friday). Rain in forecast for Friday night. Have 200 acres of corn left to go and am out of room. I have to deliver 30,000 bu to an ADM plant and lines have been terrible (2-5 hour wait). Last year it was a drive-thru from Cct. 20 thru Nov. 15. Their price is 25-30 cents a bu. better than anyone around. Two years ago the ethanol plant was within a penny. Most everyone is done with corn except for a few of us. A lot of nh3 has been applied this past week and half. Fall tillage is getting done where guys are planning on corn on corn.
  

  
  Pic taken Thanksgiving Eve. Still have 190 acres of corn to do. Trying to get some fall work done. A fair amount of nh3 and fall tillage has been done this past week. 5 % of corn left to go in my county. Videos courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
  
  
  
  
   
• 11/28 - Mitchell County, Iowa: Cutting stalks with a D8 & 60' Heston.
  

  -- Mitchell County, Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 11/23 - Henry County, Ohio: Wet and getting wetter. Another inch of rain today. Still a few fields of beans left and somewhere around ten percent of the corn left.
  
   
• 11/22 - Bristolville, Ohio: Started corn yesterday evening with the (new to us) New Holland TR99. Huge difference between the TR99 and the TR85's he used to run. We can just keep up with it using two trucks and two gravity wagons. Corn was averaging around 175bpa. Average of soybeans this year was around 40bpa. Video courtesy of ACFarmer89’s YouTube channel.
  

  -- Bristolville, Ohio (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  

• 11/23 - Texas: Rain came to large parts of Texas, an early Thanksgiving feast for already planted winter pastures, according to Texas AgriLife Extension Service personnel. Though welcome, the rain came too late for drought-hammered summer pastures, many of which are in sad shape, according to AgriLife Extension county agent reports.
  
   
• 11/23 - Cedar Rapids, Iowa: Using a Case IH 600 QuadTrac for tillage in Iowa. Video courtesy of http://lefebure.com/
  

• 11/22 - Sigel, Ill.: Corn was much better than last year.  5 year history for continuous corn was 186 bu. per acre, Last year it was 155. This is our 4th highest on record. Extra sidedress nitrogen paid off. Last year sold $3.85 to $4.85 corn, this year sold 75% of production at $7.54 corn.  That will make a nice Christmas, for us and the tax man. Beans made 62 whole farm avg.  Double crop avg. 32, not bad for the excess rains in June Then very little rain in July & Aug.  Most of our ground has been corn on corn for 30 years. Very pleased with the outcome. 
  
   
• 11/22 - Downs, Ill.: Well, here it is: the 2011 Harvest video. 2011 will definitely go down into the books as a crazy year. It started out pretty great. In June, the crops were looking phenomenal... then, the rain stopped. Central Illinois barely received any rain from July-September. Adding to that obstacle, July and August saw hot days and warm nights. You'll see the yield monitor in parts of the video. We would get into some really good 200+ bushel/acre corn, then it would drop off to below 100 bu/ac, then right back up. We were very fortunate though to have a good time this year and a lot of fun making this video and taking pictures. Tom Petty said it best in this song....."It was a beautiful day, the sun beat down I had the radio on, I was drivin." So true. We are ready to relax this winter, do some traveling, and continue preparing for next year. I hope you enjoy the video and see you in 2012! Video courtesy of www.wentworthfamilyfarms.com.
  

• 11/21 - Haakon County, S.D.: Finished fall tillage in October of 1991.
  
   
• 11/21 - North central Kansas: Finished harvest on 11-15, Tuesday. Even though we had 24 days over 100 degrees this summer corn and beans held on very well. 154 bushels an acre for the corn and 50+bpa for the beans. These are above average yields for our area. Early planted corn, that planted before May 8th had severe pollination problems. Some of this corn for people was silage with yields funning 3-40 bpa. Our corn was planted the first week of June and did not suffer this problem.
  
  
   
• 11/21 - Dickinson County, Iowa: Corn yields below average due to early wetness. Soybeans in mid-50's
  
   

• 11/21 - East central Iowa: Now that's what I call service! Combine and 2 tractors will use about 400 gallons when close to being on empty (400 x $3.70= $1480). No wonder there isn't any money left at the end of the year! Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
  
  
  
   
• 11/21 - Centre County, Pa.: I don’t do any fall tillage, since I am a no-till farmer that would be classified as a useless pursuit, similar to picking belly button lint or such
  
   
• 11/21 - Winneshiek County, Iowa: Corn is in the bin—yields down slightly from last year, but still have to be considered strong.  Tillage work is completed.  Traditionally put fertilizer and NH3 down in the spring pre-plant and elected to do that again in 2012.

• 11/18 - East Central Iowa: An update.
  

• 11/17 - Green County, Wis.: Beans were some of the best ever. Average 60+ on all acres, had one small field average 78. Corn was tremendous for the year. Averaged 182 bu over all acres. Had some good farms do 200+. Wind storm blew down some that was effected. We will wrap up fall tillage tomorrow. We have been running turbo disc over corn stalks and then hitting with ripper or chisel plow.
  
   
• 11/17 - West Salem, Ohio: Excited to have finished 1st & 2nd crop soybean #harvest11 last night, enjoying a rain today before we start back into corn! @farmerhaley
  
  
   
• 11/17 - Kendallville, Ind.: After eight weeks on the road, AgDay is at its final stop on the Interstate 80 harvest tour. Since mid-September we've visited farms from Nebraska to Ohio to gauge this year’s corn and soybean crops. Our last stop is in Kendallville, Ind. where harvest is rolling along. Watch AgDay at www.AgDay.com.
  
  
   

• 11/17 - East central Iowa: We’ve been hauling corn in the early mornings to ADM plant that is 60 miles away. Check out how long the lines are!. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
  
  
  

• 11/16 - Dekalb County, Ind.: Most beans done with average yields , some 20 to 30 yields, but most in the 40's and some 50's reported, corn is probably about 70% done with yields all over the board, heard of a lot of 60 to 100 bu/acre in some areas, and some running from 100 to 190 bu/acre. Way below our average, also fighting muddy fields, probably will have to freeze-up to finish the corn
  

• 11/15 - Grant County, S.D.: My crops were 30% less than last year.
   

• 11/15 - Onondaga County, N.Y.: Heavy corn yields at high test weights.
  

• 11/14 - Barron County, Wis.: Completely finished with the 2011 harvest and mostly done with the fall tillage. Corn crop was one the best we have had with an average yield of 175 bu/a and one field that had a yield of 210 bu/a. Test weight was not as high as last year but still very good at 57 to 58 1/2. Very little drying cost as it was coming off the field at 16-19% moisture. Soybeans were good at about 50 bu/a, but could have been about 60 if not hit by the early frost in mid-September. Corn silage was fair at about 22 ton/a. Going to put some acres into 15 in. rows next year to try to push yield up closer to 30 ton/a.
  
   
• 11/14 - Caldwell County, Mo.: We got the rest of our lime put on and finished up plowing.
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 11/14 - Haakon County, S.D.: Great year. CC winter wheat 35+. Corn 90+. 100 % No-till. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  
   

• 11/14 - Jackson County, Iowa: Can’t complain about the yields, especially with all the goose-necked corn we have. The second video gives you a tour of our neck of the woods. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
  

• 11/11 - Cayuga County, N.Y.: Done with corn. Our "final average" just shy of 170 bu/a. Weather has been great all 10 days to start November. Most guys went back to beans and got them done. Sold 5000 bu. beans for fall 2012 $13/bu at farm back in August. To see prices now wish I did more. Happy holidays to all.
  
   
• 11/11 - Western Walsh county, northeast North Dakota: The country has gotten pretty quiet around here.  A warm, dry fall has allowed everyone time to get jobs done that had been delayed with very wet falls the past number of years.  Thousands of acres of CRP were not renewed by the USDA, so all that ground was burned off, work multiple times, drainage ditches cleaned, and now it's about ready for seeding. My son and I took on 350 ac. of CRP.  It's a lot of work, but again, we had the weather.  Lots of tree rows cleaned up and burned, rocks picked, etc. Not much grain is moving, in part because we had all these other things to get done.  Even had time to go deer hunting last weekend. Now we're into the "meeting season".
  
   
• 11/11 - Sandusky, Mich.: Harvest video captured on the last day of sugar beet lifting for Stoutenburg Farms of Sandusky, Michigan. See two Artsway 6812 harvesters lift 12 rows of beets on 20 inch spacing. Also see the Michigan Sugar Sandusky piling ground adjacent to Stoutenburg's field. Video courtesy of eagerjeffrey's YouTube channel.
  
  
   

• 11/11 - Crooks, S.D.: Just a quick recap of soybean harvest for 2011. Went very fast this year with wonderful temps and no rain! Video courtesy of therealfarmgirl’s YouTube channel.
  

• 11/10 - Otero County, Colo.: Two thirds done with corn average running around 200 bu/acre. Had one field do 240. All irrigated. Soil moisture very low.
   
   

• 11/10 - Marshall, Minn.: I just drove up Hwy 23 through the heart of MN, and I would say that the elevators are not even close to full, like last year and previous years. In fact, I heard that the ADM ethanol plant was nearly running out of corn and narrowed the basis to 10 cents to bring in grain, but they won't pull ahead any Dec corn because they don't know that they will have enough corn to keep the plant running at capacity. And MN was supposed to help carry the poor corn crop!
   
   

• 11/10 - East central Iowa: A picture is worth a thousand words (this is a photo from our farm on Wednesday (Nov. 9) morning)! 2-4 inches of this crap is expected. 30-40 % corn in county left to go.

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 11/9 - Ingham County, Mich.: ADM in Webberville has been full for almost a week now. They must now understand the concept of harvest because they pulled this stunt last year too!
  
   
• 11/9 - Henry County, Ohio: The year to throw the calendar out the window. Beans planted June 7 yielded 77 bpa. Beans planted in May yield 30 bpa. Corn planted in June is 50 to 70 bpa better than the May corn. 95 percent of beans gone and maybe 50 percent of corn gone in county. 
   
   

• 11/9 - Allen County, Kan.: Got about 200 acres to finish and it is going to be tough from here on out. Rain finally came yesterday to the tune of as of this writing.... 3.56 inches. Yields are well below average with a high of 10 bpa to 3.2 bpa with an overall average so far of 3.86 bpa -- very disappointing. A lot of the pods had shattered and the moisture measured an average of 9.72% with a test weight average of 54.82 lbs per bu. Not looking forward to mudding out the remainder of the crop but it has to be done. We’ll get ‘em next year! Have a great one 
   
   

• 11/9 - Texas: Large swathes of the state received rain, from slow drizzles to heavy downpours, but the moisture came too late this year for most rangeland, according to a Texas AgriLife Extension Service expert.

  
  "The reason is that we have predominantly warm-season, rangeland-type grasses here in Texas," said Dr. Charles Hart, AgriLife Extension range specialist and associate department head of the department of ecosystem science and management at Texas A&M University. "Most of the grasses are warm-season grasses and their growing season is during the hot months of the year." That’s not to say there wasn’t a benefit from the rains received, said Hart, who is based at the Texas AgriLife Research and Extension Center at Stephenville.

  November rains came too late for most Texas rangeland, such as this stretch in Schleicher County, south of San Angelo, where the only things left growing are cacti and mesquite. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Dr. Charles Hart) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 11/8 - LaGrange, Ind.: Harvest is done. Beans ran 35.7 bu./acre and 14.5% moisture.
  
   
• 11/8 - Le Sueur Ccounty, Minn.: Did not even put any wheat in the ground, we planted tillage radishes on last years winter wheat ground and they did not sprout to grow , they were planted late august and very little since beans were planted late and froze and were combined in the first eight days of October and that it is getting a little late for Winter wheat here unless we have ideal conditions, with no moisture to get it started and low prices compared to corn why plant that late. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  
   

• 11/8 - East central Iowa: Trying to beat the 2-4 inches of rain that’s on the way. We finished beans up today. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  

• 11/7 - Cayuga County, N.Y.: Finally we have a week of dry weather after 16 inches of rain in August, September and October. We finished beans 270 acres avg. 42 bu/a. Not as good as 2010 corn still avg. (170+ better than 2010).
  
   
• 11/7 - Richardson County, Neb.: Harvest is virtually over here. Maybe 1-2% to go. Yields were average. Our soybeans were 7 bu. below our farm's historic average and corn a little below. After 6 weeks we got 4/10 of an inch of rain two days ago.
  
   

• 11/7 - East central Iowa: Here’s a video of another late night of combining. We ran into more goose-necked corn than I’d thought we would. We have rain in the forecast. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
   
  
  

  -- East central Iowa. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 11/7 - Trempealeau County, Wis.: Some of the best corn we have ever had, bottoms running 200-220 and the hills running 180-200bu.  The beans were disappointing, around 40bu especially how tall they were.  Overall an excellent harvest, stalks were definitely weak, and we had some corn down but nothing more than patches here and there.  Started on fall chisel plowing and now I am wishing I had a turbotill to go over the stalks with first, its taking time but we can get thru the trash but we are plugging more and more every year.  I hope everyone had a safe and successful harvest.
   
   

• 11/7- Caldwell County, Mo.: We continued to plow terraces, and cleaned up a fence row and bulldozer pile, sure was better plowing after are rain. This week we hope to apply more lime and get are plowing done. Might even go deer hunting over the weekend!!
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 11/4- East central Iowa: We received 1-2" of rain on Wednesday afternoon. Sounds like most of the state needed it (but we didn't in our part of state). The break in the action allowed time for some maintenance. 50-55%  of the corn is still in the field. A few beans are left to combine. We will start combining again today (Friday). Some nh3 is going on. Lines at the processors are horrible (2-5 hour wait).
  

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 11/4 - Belgium, Eernegem: Watch one year of farming video's in less than 10 minutes. Video courtesy of the Mattijs De Smedt YouTube channel.
  

• 11/4 - Louisiana: Sweet potatoes are more than just a Thanksgiving dish. They have become a year-round staple. LSU AgCenter correspondent Tobie Blanchard reports Louisiana growers have a good crop of sweet potatoes this year.
  

• 11/3 - Caldwell County, Mo.: We had an inch and three tenths of rain over night!!! 
   
   

• 11/3 - Southern Hancock County, Ohio: The combines are finally rolling. Most having to cut ruts to get to crop. The dust is flying but the ground is saturated. Trucks and wagons waiting on nearest roads. This is the second day of full harvest. Hope the rain holds off so the combine can get here.
   
   

• 11/3- Coles County, Ill.: Crops on some of my clay ground were as bad as I feared. 112 bu. corn and 27 bu. acre soybeans. Corn on dark ground ran 140 to 195 soybeans on dark ground 39 to 63 bu. acre. That is about 40 bu. acre short on corn and 20 bu. acre short on soybeans.

• 11/1 Hendricks County, Ind.: Seventy percent done with corn. Yields are better than expected running around 160 bu per acre. Our soybeans averaged 53 bu per acre. Thankful to the Lord for harvest and the increase He's given. Be safe.

• 11/1 Coles County, Ill. : Crops on some of my clay ground was as bad as I feared. 112 bu. corn and 27 bu. acre soybeans. Corn on dark ground ran 140 to 195 soybeans on dark ground 39 to 63 bu. acre. that is about 40 bu. acre short on corn and 20 bu. acre short on soybeans.

• 11/1 - East Central Iowa: We got back to combining corn Friday afternoon.
  
  
  
  
  
   
• 11/1 - Hancock County, Ind.: Worst corn yields ever. Just goes to show you, corn needs RAIN. I actually saw the monitor read 0 although there were lots of corn stalks. No ears on the stalks. Pray I never see another year like this.
  
   
• 11/1 - Logan and Menard counties, Illinois: William is happy that harvest is over for the year. Not to get ready for next year. Video courtesy of http://farmandranchcountry.com.
  
  
   

• 11/1 - Allen Parish, La.: Louisiana rice farmers are more than halfway through their harvest. Weather created challenges for growers throughout the season, but LSU AgCenter correspondent Tobie Blanchard reports that rice plants seem to have rebounded. Video courtesy of LSU AgCenter. http://www.lsuagcenter.com/
   

• 11/1 - Rush County, Ind.: Harvest is going better than expected but not good.
   
   

• 11/1- Louisiana: Farmers in the Pelican State are more than halfway through the corn harvest. A dry spring and early summer was hard on the crop. LSU AgCenter correspondent Tobie Blanchard has the story. Video courtesy of LSU AgCenter. http://www.lsuagcenter.com/.
  
  

Use this link to send us your comments (or e-mail CropComments@agweb.com) about the crops in your local area. Be sure to send us your photos and videos! Comments will be edited for brevity and clarity. (Please keep your comments crop-related.

Here's a sampling of what some folks are saying:

• 10/31 - Fulton, Ohio: When will we start corn harvest?
   
   

• 10/31- Northern Sauk County, Wis.: Finished soybeans and corn by the 21st of October. Could have used a little more rain in end of July but am happy with the yields we received. Corn 165.5 and beans 46.5. Beans average 11.5 moisture and corn 17.5. 100% no-till in the hills.
  
   
• 10/31- Allen County, Ind.: Finished beans, yields from 32 bpa to 63 bpa. Lack of rain except for storm that blew through around Aug 7th gave us 60+ beans but blew over a lot of corn in the area.
  
  
   
• 10/31- Caldwell County, Mo.: It’s dry, real dry. We’ve been plowing terraces – hardest plowing ever. The picture is my Mennonite neighbor picking corn, their corn is shelling off the cob terrible
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 10/31 - Lancaster County, Pa.: Still a lot of corn and soybeans to harvest. Wheat is planted and some fall plowing done. Still need to bale corn fodder once corn is harvested. Weather forecast is calling for 6-12 inches of snow tomorrow. This will hamper any harvesting in the next few days.

• 10/31 - Wisconsin: Joe Lauer, University of Wisconsin Extension Corn Agronomist, provides a diagnosis of corn harvest progress in his state and what affected yields this year.
  

• 10/28 - Nobles County, Minn.: DRY, DRY, DRY! We have not had any measureable rain since the end of July!  Fall tillage is very tough around here. The ground is as hard as cement.  Ripper points last about a 1/4 of normal. Coops are trying to custom apply anhydrous but that can't be working very good. No rain in site either. Crops were pretty good for as bad as the weather was this year. Corn averaged around 180 with beans in the low to mid 50's. Corn yields in our area are about 10 - 15 bu. less than a year ago and bean yields were about 2 - 5 bu. less than a year ago. SEND RAIN SOON! 
   
   

• 10/28- South central Michigan: Farm Journal's Rhonda Brooks -- Harvest has started in Michigan, but it’s been a stop-and-go process this year, according to Missy Bauer Farm Journal Associate Field Agronomist. While farmers were slow to get to their fields because of poor weather conditions, the good news is that yields are average to above average for both corn and soybeans. In the following video, Bauer shares more about what she’s seeing in fields in her area.
  
  
  
   
• 10/28- Reno County, Kan.: Done with bean harvest. 4 to 5 bu./acre except a ten acre patch on underflow ground that made 17 bu./acre. Worst crop in my 35 years farming. Wheat i planted after beans will need rain to come up and none in the 7 day forecast.
  
  
   
• 10/24- Texas Panhandle: Beef Today’s Steve Cornett -- There is moisture falling in some of the drought area this morning. I shot a picture a minute ago off the front porch. That is rain, I suppose, but it was snow not long ago. Not to suggest this is a “drought breaker,” mind you. It’s still awful dry over a very large part of the Southern Plains, but darned if some of us don’t have some wheat sprouted from an earlier round of moisture a couple of weeks ago. Keep reading about the snow in Steve’s Out to Pasture blog.
  

  -- Texas Panhandle (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   

• 10/28 - Summit County, Ohio: We have come to a crawl here. If the harvest was going any slower we would be going in reverse.  I was able to get a 35 acres of beans off this past Tuesday and thats it.  I here that my fellow farmers in the area are all in the same shape as me.  The fields are so wet that when we are able to get out its for hours, not days, before the rain comes back.  I did run off 65 acres of corn awhile back, but it too was very wet, around 26-27%. The yields on the beans are running in the low to mid 50's and the corn was around 155-165 bu, all about average for N.E. Ohio. 

• 10/28 - Henry County, Ohio: With a quarter inch of rain falling every other day this week. Along with over fourteen inches of rain since Sept. 1. Harvest is becoming a huge muddy mess with half the beans to go in county and almost all the corn.  

• 10/27 - Tipton County, Tenn.: Corn harvest complete, yields were down slightly from last year due to the heat and lack of rain. Soybean harvest complete, early soybean yields were below average, later soybean yields were average. Cotton harvest 90% complete, yields have been average to slightly above average.
  
   
• 10/27- Cedar Rapids, Iowa: Watch a Case IH 2588 and 7120 harvesting corn in Iowa. Video courtesy of http://lefebure.com/.
  
   

• 10/27- AgDay Crop Watch: See the latest AgWeb Crop Comments and other crop updates as reported on AgDay TV.
  

• 10/26 - Stearns County, Minn.: Corn has been surprisingly great, with yields averaging just over 200 bu./acre, with moistures coming in at 14%-16% and test weights of around 58. Soybeans averaged 56 bu./acre, but lower test weights. 
   
   

• 10/26- East Central Iowa: Soybean harvest seems to drag on forever around here. Another light shower went through this morning, delaying start time again today. We have two days left. The only good thing is that beans start out at 14%-15% and within one or two hours they are down to 11%-12%, 55-67 bu./acre. From what I hear, corn is down to 15%-21% moisture. 70% left to go and guys are having trouble getting through some of it (goosenecked or down). Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  

• 10/25 - Renville County, Minn.: Corn: 115 to 175 bu./acre; soybeans: 40 to 51 bu./acre. Extremely dry here.
   
   
• 10/25 - Lancaster, Neb.: Bean harvest about finished in this area. We had farms average 44, 50, 62 and 63, it all depended on fertility. The 44 bu. farm was new this year and the 50 bu. new last year. Corn harvest moving fast, some guys about done, others have a long ways to go yet. Yields from 165 to 190, would say we will average around the 175 mark. Both corn and beans above our five-year averages. Co-op already applying fall NH3. Been a real dry harvest, only one rain event to slow us up, will need good moisture to replenish subsoil moisture.
  
   
• 10/25- Cayuga County, N.Y.: Half done with corn. The average so far is about 180 bu./acre. We have about 100 acres of soybeans done with an average of 45 bu./acre.
  
   

• 10/25 - Keith, Arthur, and Perkins counties, Neb.: Corn harvest is well under way, but we’re still waiting for some fields to dry down. In non-hailed areas, yields are good, with 100 bu./acre rainfed corn. Bean harvest is done and sugarbeet harvest is under way and appears to be about average. Conditions here are generally dry, with just enough spotty rain to settle the dust. Wheat planting was timely and normal. Alfalfa was cut in early October and will have a little regrowth before winter. Alfalfa got a slow start last spring, but ended a little above average. Provided by Doug Anderson, University of Nebraska Extension educator for University of Nebraska's Crop Watch. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
   

• 10/25- Harmon County, Okla.: The SUNUP crew travels to southwestern Oklahoma to discuss the recent rainfall with Harmon County Extension educator Lawrence Tomah and see the planting under way at the OSU wheat demonstration plots.
  
  
  
   
• 10/25- Dakota, Dixon, and Thurston counties, Neb.: Soybean harvest is essentially complete, there are always a few stragglers, but I would say it's 99% done. Corn harvest is going well, with almost one-third out already. They are going full tilt and may be done by the end of the month, provided they can find a place to sell or store it, if the dry weather holds. Speaking of that, it is still abnormally dry and a few more dry days could get us back into the fire danger category. A few fields have been tilled. Provided by Keith Jarvi, University of Nebraska Extension educator for University of Nebraska's Crop Watch.
  
   

• 10/25 - Gage County, Neb.: Recent rains have helped reduce dust and fire risk as we move through corn harvest at a fast pace. Wheat fields are looking good and cover crop trials are greening up fields of early adopters. Soybean yields ranged from 30-60 bu./acre (average 45 bu./acre) on dryland and 50-70 bu./acre (average of 63 bu./acre) on irrigated fields. Corn yields have been from 70 to 180 bu./acre on dryland (average 125 bu./acre) and 170-250 bu./acre on irrigated (215 bu./acre). Provided by Paul Hay, University of Nebraska Extension educator for University of Nebraska's Crop Watch. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   

• 10/25 - Franklin Parish, La.: This Week in Louisiana Agriculture's Kristen Oaks speaks with one sweet potato farmer who says this year's crop has been anything but sweet.
  

• 10/24 - Fillmore County, Minn.: Beans yielded 52-53 bu./acre. We caught a 1" rain in mid-August that made the crop, otherwise fairly dry after mid-July. Corn is running 190-210 bu./acre, 16%-19%, on good bottom ground, and about 155-175 bu./acre, 15%-17%, on the hilltop fields. We had a lot of moisture early and very little late, especially after the July heat wave. Real surprised and thankful for the yields we have gotten. Now marketing, that’s another story.
   
   
• 10/24 - Putnam County, Ohio: Soybeans are running better than we expected considering the wet spring and dry summer. We are running 35-39 bu./acre.
  
   
• 10/24- East Central Iowa: Weather held out until right now. A thin line of thundershowers is rolling through as I am typing (Sunday, 9:10 p.m.). I think a friend and I are the only ones with beans left around here! (Three days left.) Video is from Saturday. A lot of corn is still out in the fields (my guess is 70%). The deer in the video from last week appears to be "gun-shy"! After further review, it appears to be injured, but not totally sure. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
  
  
   
• 10/24 - Yellow Medicine, Minn.: Corn is all over the board, depending on variety and genetic ability to withstand greensnap. Overall, disappointing corn yields, average to above soybean yields. By the way, the shot of the yield monitor is from last year.
  
   

• 10/24 - Caldwell County, Mo.: We’re on our last farm, minus a small field of clover beans.
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
   
• 10/24 - Clark County, Wis.: Beans in, about 53 bu. Started corn today (10/22), not running like we figured – maybe 170 bu.
  
   
• 10/24 - South Louisiana: Rice harvest in South Louisiana, before a hurricane hits!
  

  -- South Louisiana (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 10/24 - Malhuer County, Ore.: Weather is unseasonably warm. Corn harvest is 40% finished, yields are off 28% so far. Poor corn yields mixed with the highest input cost ever per acre means we are looking at severely cutting corn acres for next year. Winter wheat is planted, acres are down 20% from last year. The biggest challenges this year in order were weather, high input costs, USDA inconsistent data, market volatility. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   

• 10/24 - Kearny County, Kan.: Combined 2,200 irrigated acres. Yield was 123.4. Five-year average is 197. Thought we might get 150. Very poor year that can't get over fast enough. This doesn't count the 2,600 irrigated acres we chopped after the insurance yield came in below 60 bu. It made 15 tons. We need rain and snow this winter desperately. Hay and corn trucks coming south from the north will keep the highways very busy.
  
   
• 10/24 - Union County, S.D.: All done, and yields were poor to slightly below average. Between Missouri River flooding, too much high temps and no rain from late July to now, has really hurt yields.
  
   
• 10/24 - Lewis County, Idaho: Wheat was infected with Cephlasporium stripe rust from too much rain, yields down over 30 bu./acre. Fall seeding is almost complete, should finish today and go help some friends finish up. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  
   
• 10/24 - Louisa County, southeast Iowa: Beans were a little better than average, but corn was second worst I've ever had, although not devastating. Off by 25 to 30 bu. Beans in the mid 50s, corn in the 145-155 range.
   
   
• 10/24 - Central Lower Michigan: My name is Gary Fisher. My father (semi-retired), Wayne, and my son, Dayne, farm with me in central Lower Michigan. My son is the sixth generation to farm in the Fisher family. Five generations here in Michigan. A very proud tradition, hence the name of our farms is Fisher Tradition Farms. The first picture is of wheat harvest and the second is soybeans taken from atop our grain bins. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  

  -- Central Lower Michigan. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 10/21 - Henry County, Ohio: Three inches of rain since Tuesday afternoon. Will be a week till ground conditions will be good, if it would dry. Beans in county maybe half cut. Yields 25 to 60+ depending on location. Guys that finish by Sept. 30 are having a hard time with this fall. Very little corn out.
  
   

• 10/21- East Central Iowa: The sun finally made it out! Rain missed us (about time). Beans are 80% done in my area. I think a lot of guys will finish this weekend. If I'm lucky, I should finish early next week (if the weather cooperates and no major breakdowns). Corn is only 25% done. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  

• 10/21 Red Deer, Alberta: Last Friday we got a helicopter out to shoot our last day of harvest. My family and my boyfriend's family both farm about 4 miles apart. We got all four of our New Holland combines together and two grain karts and finished up the last field. Video courtesy of sabrinajane100's YouTube channel.
  

• 10/20 - Finney County, Kan.: Corn we cut for grain made 128 bu./acre on 2,600 irrigated acres. Normal yield is 200. Thought it would average 150. Chopped 4,500 irrigated acres that was adjusted to 45 bu./acre and averaged 14 ton silage. Train wreck for the area. Drought and 56 days of 100+ heat took care of our crops. Most feedyards are scrambling for grain. Basis at record levels. Will be record amount of corn coming south, they will be fighting with road traffic from all the hay trucks going south. Unbelievable.
  
   
• 10/20 - Auglaize County, Ohio: We finished with the beans last night. Our average was between 58 and 60 bu./acre over 350 acres. This is slightly above average on a normal year for this area, but I would consider it outstanding for this year considering that we didn't move a single tractor for planting last spring until June 1. We tried 6 to 7 acres of corn over the weekend and we were averaging between 215 and 220 bu./acre dry. Moisture was 25% to 30%. Outstanding, considering the late planting. The late planting was probably a blessing because we didn't tassel until Aug. 1 and we started getting rain again and it cooled off about one week before tasseling.
   

• 10/20 - East central Iowa: Watch these harvest videos. In the second one, keep an eye out for one big buck in the bean field. Videos courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
  
  
   
• 10/20 - Clark County, Wis.: Beans averaged 52 bu./acre over 440 acres. Corn looks good, running 175 to 190 bu./acre.

• 10/19 - Murray County, southwest Minnesota: Soybeans on my farms were better than I thought possible. But later maturity varieties were nearly 10 bu. less because of the early frost. Finished corn on Friday and I had some bins remaining empty. This was the worst corn crop I have had since 1988. Yields were just enough that crop insurance will not pay anything. Beans were 10% to 8% moisture and the corn was 15% to 12.5%. The biggest story here is how dry it is. I have had a quarter inch of rain since Aug. 1. Lots of guys are waiting to do tillage and apply nitrogen until something falls from the sky. Plan on installing a bunch of tile on some rental ground, but with cracks in the ground 2" wide, am I crazy?    
  
   
• 10/19 - Texas: Nearly all of the state received rain during the last two weeks, but even where the rains were substantial, the drought was far from over, according to Texas AgriLife Extension Service reports. Since early October, the Rolling Plains, Central and North regions received the most rain, with accumulations of 6" and more, with 2" to 3" common, according to the National Weather Service’s daily precipitation analysis. San Antonio and surrounding counties received 2" or more. With a few exceptions, the rest of the state received from a trace to about 2".
   

• 10/19 - Logan and Menard counties, Illinois: William is harvesting soybeans in the last field. Just about done for the season. Video courtesy of http://farmandranchcountry.com.
  
  
   
• 10/19 - West Texas: This is my "good" cotton. Watered it all year. Full P and K application. About 75% of normal N. Reduced N rate to save money. I honestly wish I had not spent a dime on fertilizer at this point. See more photos and read comments about this farmer's West Texas Cotton.
  

  -- West Texas (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

   

• 10/18 - Southwestern Oklahoma: The SUNUP crew travels to southwestern Oklahoma to discuss the recent rainfall with Harmon County Extension educator Lawrence Tomah and see the planting under way at the OSU wheat demonstration plots. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  
  
   
• 10/18 - Wright County, Minn.: First 100 acres of beans on sand = 42 bu. (30 bu. normal). Last 250 acres of beans on heavy clay = 38 bu. (50 bu. normal). The sand was planted 2½ weeks ahead of the heavy clay. The frost bit the later beans really hard. Conventionally tilled corn = 155 bu. Strip-till corn = 170 bu. Both are corn on beans.
  
   
• 10/18 - Louisiana: LSU AgCenter Correspondent Tobie Blanchard reports that despite drought conditions, cotton and soybean yields have been better than expected. Video courtesy of This Week in Louisiana Agriculture.
   

• 10/17 - Jefferson County, N.Y.: Just finished harvesting the first 40 acres of corn. Field was planted on May 11 and then half replanted on June 7. 8" of rain in between. Field yielded 155.6 bu./acre dry. Much better than expected.
   

• 10/17 - Steele County, Minn.: Soybean yields are off 10 bu. from last year. Corn yields variable in the fields. Corn on corn was 93 bu., corn on bean ground was 160 bu. 40% left to harvest. Good test weight. Dry weather and frost were the nail in the coffin.
   
• 10/17 - East central Iowa: Harvest has been a challenge since Tuesday. Light rain fell then and Sunday morning. 1" to 2" fell Wednesday, and we had cloudy and cool weather Thursday, which didn't help either. Beans finally got fit Saturday afternoon. Guys started beans again Sunday midafternoon. Yields 55-70 bu./acre. I custom combined 35 acres that should have yielded 70 bu./acre. Corn moisture is running from 18%-24% from what I have been told. Corn that has the higher moisture is corn that was sprayed with fungicide. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 10/17 - Clark County, Wis.: Soybeans are mostly off 50 bu. average. Corn is at 21% and letting dry a little yet. Will start on 17th.
  
   
• 10/17 - Caldwell County, Mo.: The substation bright light keeps these beans green, the photosynthesis keeps them going till a hard freeze. Can you believe they are still blooming!
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 10/17 - Franklin County, Ind.: Heard of a couple of farmers with 40 bu./acre corn and another harvested 250 acres of corn at 48 bu./acre, some of the beans running average and some below. 

• 10/14 - Darke County, Ohio: 100 acres of soybeans yielded 32 bu./acre, which seems average for our entire region that normally centers around 50 bu./acre.
   
   
• 10/14 - Griggs County, N.D.: Worst crop I have ever had. Wheat in the low 30s, soybeans in the mid 20s, corn in the low 90s. Too wet all year. Let’s get this year over and hope for a better year next year. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
  
   
• 10/14 - Oneida, N.Y.: Soybeans 1/4 harvested, yields 30 bu. on wet ground and 55 on dry. Corn just started, 24%-26% moist. Yields look to average 155. Rain for the next week.

• 10/14 - Woodford County, Ill.: Most corn fields have some wind damage, some varieties are terrible and some corn heads just won’t take it. Yields about 20 bu. less than either of past two years. Beans are very good, some areas in the 70s, but can’t complain about our 65 average so far.
  
   
• 10/14 - Logan and Menard counties, Illinois: Theo is harvesting corn. One of the first times he's driven the combine. He is 13 years old. Video courtesy of http://biggreencombine.com.
  
  
   
• 10/14 - Ingham County, Mich.: We finished planting wheat yesterday. Ended up with more acres than we had planned. Ground conditions were great. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
   
   
• 10/14 - Cayuga County, N.Y.: Just starting harvest. 100 acres corn done, average 22%, 190 bu./acre. 1 semi of beans, 13%, 54 bu./acre. Better than we were thinking it would be. 12" of rain April and May, 3" June and July, 10" August and September.
  
   
• 10/14 - DeKalb, Ill.: Two days left of bean harvest -- then the corn harvest begins. Yields look average.

• 10/13 - Sibley County, Minn.: Soybeans averaged 37.3 bu./acre, 20 less than last year. Late planting, dry August and September, and early frost hurt yields. First 100-acre field of corn was 126 bu./acre. Planted May 24, severe greensnap damage from July storm, 12%-13% moisture, 59 lb. test weight. This field did 219 bu./acre in 2009.
  
   
• 10/13 - East central Iowa: We received 1-2 inches of rain of Wednesday. We’d baled cornstalks on Monday. 25% of corn and beans are out, by my estimate. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 10/13 - Houston County, Minn.: Three separate bean yield checks yesterday. Average ground is running in the low 50s and better-than-average ground is running in the upper 50s. On a side note, the fungicide that was applied to beans is showing positive signs. Anywhere from a 3 to 10 bu. advantage. 
  
   
• 10/13 - Texas: Though large parts of Central and South Texas received substantial rains, producers should be careful about planning as if the drought were over, says a Texas AgriLife Extension Service expert. This is especially relevant for livestock producers who must rely on rain-nurtured pastures and rangeland, said Dr. Travis Miller, AgriLife Extension agronomist and a member of the Governor’s Drought Preparedness Council.
  

  What's remarkable about this Washington County pasture, located about 75 miles northwest of Houston, is that there isn't any pasture whatsoever, not even stubble, says Miller. "Stock for drought; plan for opportunities," he says. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Dr. Travis Miller) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

   

• 10/12 - Stearns County, Minn.: Finished soybeans on Saturday with an average of 53 bu./acre. Hand-shelled some corn that is 16% and some that was 20%. Yield checks about 180-220. Probably going to start right after this rain moving through. I got 465 acres to do and the weather looks like it is going to change for the worse here by the end of the month.
  
   
• 10/12 - East central Iowa: Combined 20 acres of bottoms after a morning shower. Beans got tough in a hurry. The last 8 acres were really tough, but we finished them with heavy rain in the forecast (now it probably won't rain). Beans are running around 55- 65 bu./acre in my neck of the woods. Video courtesy of scotthinch’s YouTube channel.
  
  
   
• 10/12 - Jeromesville, Ohio: Our soybean crop is a bit below average this year, at around 50 bu./acre average, though we have had some 70 bu./acre beans. We’re seeing them come in at about 14% moisture. This year isn’t the bumper year like last year, but we’re probably doing OK given how the season started out.
  
  
   
• 10/12 - Allamakee County, Iowa: Ran two separate yield checks yesterday, while getting the GreenStar set in the combine. The moisture was consistent at 22% and the yield was 188 on one check and 190 on the other. Overall, happy with that, just so everything stays standing...
  
   
• 10/12 - Sullivan, Ill.: This video uses many angles to document the 2011 corn harvest at Coon Creek Farms. Video courtesy of CoonCreekFarm’s YouTube channel.
  

• 10/11 - Woodbury County, Iowa: Got results on 320 acres seed corn yesterday. It ran about 53 bu., much better than we had expected by field inspection. Irrigation saved our crops from much yield damage this year in this area.
  
   
• 10/11 - West Tennessee: Corn harvest is over 2/3 complete and yields are doing very well on our family farm in Tennessee.
  
  
   
• 10/11 - Caldwell County, Mo.: They started on our beans Monday afternoon. Places they are really good, had some weak spots on the thinner ground, overall for the dry weather good beans.
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 10/11 - Boone County, Ky.: See a video from late September that documents the first day of corn harvest for a couple of Kentucky producers. The corn is making around 140 to 150 bu./acre and running around 21% moisture.
  

• 10/10 - Stearns County, Minn.: We started corn this weekend. Have never seen such a variance in yields in one field. You can tell exactly where the tile is needed. It goes from 170 to 80 in about 100'. But overall, the rest of it looks to be in that 150 range and about 15% to 20% moisture. Pretty happy with everything, considering the way this spring was.
   
   
• 10/10 - Western Walsh county, northeast North Dakota: This for the wheat grower in northern Montana who was questioning the grain companies' switch from bidding December futures (MGEX) to March. In my area, all but one grain company did the same thing. This morning's bids are 0.15 under the March. The one that still is on December is bidding $.60 under the December. The result is that this gives the farmer about a $0.30 better price. Guess who's getting the wheat? Mike Krueger, a well respected market analyst from Fargo, wrote last week that the grain trade is making a rumble about going to the May contract. The crooks!
  
  Some sunflowers and corn are all that is left to harvest around here. Everyone is working on fall tillage and cleaning drainage ditches, burning, etc. Waiting for the soil temps to get down to 50°F so we can start with fall fertilizer. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
   
• 10/10 - Wright County, Iowa: Just finished soybeans. Yield right at 50 bu. at 9% moisture. Thought they would have yielded more. Too wet early and too dry in August. We need a rain.
   
   
• 10/10 - Caldwell County, Mo.: Our pasture sure went downhill this week. Notice other neighbors feeding hay also. Combine will be here Monday to cut our beans. Their corn was going down in spots, they wanted to finish it up. The picture is of my friend Joe, he switched over to corn as the beans got to 7% moisture. Joe will finish up corn Monday.
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 10/10 - Southeast Beadle County, S.D.: Done with soybeans, averaged 40 bu./acre, 10% moisture. Last year's were better. Too many wet spots in fields this year, with 0 to low yield in both corn and beans. 25% of cropland did not get planted (too wet). 1/3 done with corn harvest, with dryland at 125 to 150 bu./acre and irrigated 180 to 220 bu./acre. Moisture is very low, running below 13%. Test weight good, 57 to 60 lb.
   
   
• 10/10 - Allen County, Ind.: Wet spring and dry summer. Corn looks to be about 75% of normal, beans got some late rain that should help. Hope to start beans Oct. 8, about a month late.
  
   
• 10/10 - Butler County, Iowa: Beans averaged 55 bu., 5 bu. less than last year. 2.0 to 2.2 were 10 bu. better than 2.5's. Frost hurt them. Have done 200 acres of C/C averaging right at 190 across the scale, about 15-18 bu. better than last year. A lot of stalk problems from high winds. Thank God for the nice weather.

• 10/10 - Clay County, Ark.: Corn finished 15-20 bu. below average. Cut 210 acres of beans, yields from low 50 to 75 bu./acre (61 average so far, all irrigated). Dryland will be waste of fuel and manpower, might average 5 bu.
  
   
• 10/10 - East central Iowa: Started beans Wednesday, so far yields are good (52-62 bu./acre). I hear of 70 bu./acre, but have yet to find them (coffee shop talk?). Moisture is in the 8.5% to 10.5% range. Along with getting some custom work done, I have been trying to get some of the "fun to get to farms" done just in case it rains for an extended time. It has been a couple of weeks since it rained here and temperatures have been in the 70°-85°F range.
  
  
   
• 10/10 - Reno County, Kan.: Looked more like the Sahara desert here on Oct. 6 -- 50 mph winds really took out a lot of newly planted wheat. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   
   
   
• 10/10 - Cambell County, S.D.: Here is a picture of a typical ear on Aug. 20, corn is now 22%.
  

  -- Cambell County, S.D. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 10/10 - Southeast North Dakota: Responding to Northern Montana’s question on wheat futures. The elevators in this region are also using March 12 Mpls Futures to arrive at cash bids for the farmer. What I would expect is that the basis would be better than the -40 under they are currently bidding, since Dec. 11 is 25 cents better than March 12 futures they are using to give the farmer a price. I have found one elevator bidding -0.05 and would hope to see the others soon bidding that also for anyone wanting to sell. But it is corn and bean harvest now, so they probably don't want wheat right now anyway. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)   

• 10/7 - Graham County, Kan.: 50-60 mph winds moved through the area yesterday and all the milo that was dried down is now lying flat on the ground. Sure is a good year to have a row crop head!
  
   
• 10/7 - McLeod County, Minn.: Just finished beans. Average from everyone that I am talking to was about 30 bu./acre. Ground so hard and compacted that guys that are trying to plow are ripping them in half. Frost and late planting really hit this area hard. Corn moisture is running in the teens all the way up to the low 40s. We need some rain real bad. We went from flood after flood to drought in less than one month. Analysts keep saying bean crop better than expected. Well, everyone I know in Minnesota is saying 10%-50% worse than expected. The frost did way more damage than anyone is admitting.
  
   
• 10/7 - Northern Montana: I have a question for everyone out there. We grow spring wheat in northern Montana and had a somewhat challenging year. First too wet and then too dry. We ended up with less than average crops, but passable with the current prices. I went to the elevator to sell some of my production because the December futures have been doing so well, only to find out that two weeks ago the elevators began pricing grain on the March and not December board. In previous years, we could price grain up to a month before contract expiration. Is this happening all over the U.S. or just here? (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
   
• 10/7 - Sibley County, Minn.: We will finish soybeans tomorrow, yields in the low 40s. Planted in the first week of June...too wet...froze 9-15 too soon. 8% to 7% moisture, I didn't think that was possible! Some corn to the south 12%. Can't wait till this year is over, and try again next year! Have a save harvest, everyone!
  
   
• 10/7 - Eernegem, Belgium: See maize harvest with New Holland and Claas Jaguar 880.
  
   
   
• 10/7 - DeKalb County, Ind.: Started first field of beans today, might make 40 bu./acre. Our normal average: 50 bu./acre on this ground. Looks like yields will be off 10% to 20% from normal, hope they get better as we go.
  
   

• 10/7 - Brown City, Mich.: Watch this soybean harvest. Video courtesy of eagerjeffrey's YouTube channel.
  
   

• 10/6 - Faribault County, Minn.: We will finish beans today. Yield has been disappointing, mostly low 40s with a few up to 50. Usually we average 55 to 60. The beans look like 60 bu., just all vine and no beans. Too wet in June, too hot and dry later and frost in September. Corn fields look completely dead and wind beaten with the tops broken off. Hope the lower part keeps standing. It is tinder dry and the fire danger is high. Makes me scared to take the combine into the corn fields. Slight chance of rain this weekend would be good.
  
   
• 10/6 - Streator, Ill.: I would expect the vast majority of the wheat to be planted in this area within the next week.  A late soybean harvest is pushing the plantings back a bit. Most growers will no-till wheat behind soybeans. We are on a run of perfect harvest weather. I would also expect similar number of acres being planted as in the past years. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
   
• 10/6 - East central Iowa: Here are some videos of combining beans.
  
  
  
  
  
  
   
• 10/6 - Dickey County, N.D.: Finished soybeans today with a 43+ bu./acre average. Looked better than that, but drowned out low areas and frost trimmed the yield.
   
   
• 10/5 - Cleveland, Miss.: Farm Journal's Rhonda Brooks -- Joseph Crews was ready to move into soybean fields late last week when an untimely rain came through his area, pushing the start of harvest back a few days. Crews, who farms near Cleveland, Miss., says the soybean crop looks good and he’s pleased with how his season went. "We were particularly lucky this year in that we didn’t have much of an insect problem, and we got good control of weeds, too," he says. In the following video, Crews shares some agronomic details from his 2011 season.
  
  
   

• 10/5 - Illiopolis, Ill.: Farm Journal's Pam Smith -- Watch seed corn harvest near Illiopolis, Ill. (This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture.")
  
   

• 10/5 - Ransom County, N.D.: Finished beans today. Yields were OK but some 12 bu. less than 2010. It’s very dry here, it hasn’t rained since the end of July. Tillage is useless because it just brings up huge lumps of dirt. Corn moistures from 16% to 30%. Yields disappointing at 100-120 bu./acre. Lots of variability due to wind damage in July. Winter wheat hasn’t emerged because it’s just too dry for it to germinate. Our droughts usually begin in the fall, hopefully that’s not the case this year.
   
   
• 10/5 - Eyre Peninsula, South Australia: We here in South Australia have had a very dry and hot September and it really stripped a lot of yield. On the Upper Eyre Peninsula, yields would have ranged from 0.84 to 2.52 tn/ha, Lower E.P. would've ranged from 1.68 to 5.05 tn/ha. But over the last six days, we have received from 15 to 60+ mm, and the later sown crops which would've come to not much will be looking to be 1tn+/ha on the Upper E.P. and 2.52 tn/ha on the Lower E.P. Early sown crops will only gain a little from this rain, as they are ripening. Overall, we are looking at an above average year, but not a record breaker.
  
   
• 10/5 - Lincoln County, Mo.: I have harvested 30% of the soybeans and am getting a 23 bu./acre average. Last year’s average was 50.
   
   
• 10/5 - East central Iowa: Did 60 acres of high moisture corn. Corn is running 28%-30% mt. and 210/bu./acre dry (it is one of my better fields). It is very easy sometimes to get lost combining, because corn is really messed up in spots because of two windstorms earlier this fall. I know I'm not alone. Unofficial reports of 60-75 bu./acre beans.
  
  
   
• 10/5 - Ingham County, Mich.: Started beans today, much drier than I thought they would be. 12.5 yield was very good, better then expected. Hand shelled some corn and tested at 27 moisture. Hope all have a safe harvest.
   
   
• 10/5 - Clark County, Wis.: Wheat was light. We’ve had around 65 bu./acre in beans and now we’re running 65 bu./acre at this time. Corn looks good. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   
• 10/5 - Lincoln County, Minn.: Soybeans are running surprisingly decent considering the lack of rain from July on. Beans running 45 bpa + on ground that didn't get hail.

• 10/5 - Pipestone County, Minn.: Finished beans today, averaged 36.75. About 12 less than last year. Corn is still wet. Hand shelled a few ears and came up with 22% and 31%.
  
   
• 10/5 - Centerview, Tenn.: Farm Journal's Rhonda Brooks -- Tim Johnston wasn’t sure whether he would be able to get a decent corn crop off the river bottom he farms near Centerview, Tenn., this fall given the floodwaters that swept over his fields last May. "See that road over there? The water was just about up to it last spring," he says, pointing to a nearby highway overpass. Fortunately, the waters receded in time for Johnston to get his crop planted, and he is one of the first in his area to start running a combine. Listen as he gives an overview of his crop and harvest conditions.
  
  
   
• 10/5 - Henry County, Ohio: Nothing harvested around here. 9½" of rain in September along with cool weather has really slowed maturity. This is driving the guys crazy that need to be done with beans by Sept. 30.
   
   
• 10/5 - Texas: Another year of drought, or even five to ten years more drought? The first is highly likely, and the second, though harder to predict, a strong possibility, according to John Nielsen-Gammon, state climatologist. Regarding the drought continuing through this winter and spring, everyone is watching what appears to be a new La Niña developing, Nielsen-Gammon said.
  

  A period of frequent Texas drought might "last another 15 or 20 years. It seems likely to last another decade," said John Nielsen-Gammon, state climatologist. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Robert Burns) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 10/5 - McPherson County, Kan.: The end of September means just one thing on Baldwin Farms: It's time to plant some wheat. Video courtesy of Baldwin Farms. (This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture.") (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 10/4 - Howard County, Iowa: Soybeans went from 18% two days ago to 9% or lower. Yield low to mid 40s. A lot of corn is flat on the ground from 80-90 mile per hour winds. Moisture low 20s to low 30s. Yield 100 to 150.
   
   
• 10/4 - Central Illinois: This year’s harvest has provided the greatest variability Farm Journal Field Agronomist Ken Ferrie has seen in 20 years of conducting the Test Plots program.
  
  "So far, we’ve been focusing on corn and are about to start soybeans," he explains. "But within one replication, we’ve seen 100-bu. swings. We’ll use the yield maps and NDVI maps to help understand this yield information better. Nitrogen is going to be a big factor in these plots, so we’ll need to make sure that if we are studying a fungicide, we identify how nitrogen also relates."
  
  As for how harvest is shaping up across his area of central Illinois, Ferrie reports that it’s been a mixed bag.
  
  "In the northern part of our territory, it has been kind of slow. But a long, slow grain fill tends to give us better yields. This can be frustrating for the farmer eager to get in the field, but the higher moistures have led to higher yields this year," he says. "In the southern part, we’ve had poor yields due to lack of rain. The low moisture has sped up harvest as farmers are chasing downed corn and some are already doing tillage."
  
  (This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture.")
  
  
   

• 10/4 - Lebanon, Ind.: First field cut about 50 acres on the 21st of September. The beans are running about 13.5% moisture. (This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture.")
  
  
   
• 10/4 - McPherson County, Kan.: Highlights from the corn harvest that just wrapped up. Video courtesy of Baldwin Farms. (This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture.")
  
   

• 10/3 - Thomas County, Kan.: We are presently drilling HRW wheat and we are sending a ladder down with each seed as it is very dry and getting worse by the day. Have lived here my entire life and this looks like the '56-'57 years. Corn is drying down very rapidly and we will pick some dryland next week maybe it will rain. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
   
• 10/3 - Stearns, Minn.: Soybean harvest well under way with 66 bu. yields so far. Corn moisture dropped from 30% to 24% in one week! Should be harvesting corn by middle of October.
   
   
• 10/3 - East central Iowa: Finally got started with high moisture corn. This fall will be a long one (corn looks good from the road, but it is goosenecked enough to make it a challenge to stay on the right row). Combines will really start running around here this week. Livestock guys will be doing high moisture corn and the other guys will be running beans.
  
  
   

• 10/3 - Caldwell County, Mo.: On our farm this week we put lime on the pastures. Our well went dry this week that we water our cows from. Beans look ready -- waiting on the neighbor, be here this Thursday! Had 34 Saturday morning.
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 10/3 - Shelby County, Ind.: The weather here sucks! Been raining off and on for 10 days -- cut off low. Where was this rain a month ago? LOL! Did get about 20 acres shelled this week, got 250 of beans ready when low moves out, maybe cutting the first of the week.
   
   
• 10/3 - Calhoun County, Miss.: Brad Spencer of Spencer and Sons Farms in Calhoun County tests a bed of sweet potatoes near Vardaman on Sept. 28 to see if they are ready to harvest. (Photo by MSU Ag Communications/Scott Corey)
  

  -- Calhoun County, Miss. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

Use this link to send us your comments (or e-mail CropComments@agweb.com) about the crops in your local area. Be sure to send us your photos and videos! Comments will be edited for brevity and clarity. (Please keep your comments crop-related.

Here's a sampling of what some folks are saying:

• 9/30 - O’Brien County, Iowa: Yesterday was a wild day with 50 mile/hour winds there were at least 15 combine fires in this corner of IA. one sheriff's department was asking farmers to stop combing and wait for the wind to die down. Our corn is coming out at 16.5 to 23% moisture, yields for have been 120 in down corn to 200 plus. Starting beans today.
   
   
• 9/30 - East central Iowa: I live 7 miles from the Mississippi River and it always seems like we start harvesting as late as anyone in the country. We received over an inch of rain on Monday. High moisture corn may start this weekend (25-30% mt.). Beans around me may be ready by next week. Beans still appear to be one of the best ever (we will see next week....). Picture is of my hired help watching gates for me feeding cows.
  

  -- East central Iowa. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
   
• 9/30 - Pipestone County, Minn.: Beans mudded in on June 7 went 38. They were really good over the hills, but there wasn't much in the bottoms.
  
   

• 9/30 - Seymour, Ind.: Ben Thompson of Seymour, Ind., found this 5-bean pod this season in his field of Genuity® Roundup Ready 2 Yield® soybeans.  Farmers who plant this second-generation soybean technology from Monsanto have reported seeing more 3, 4 and even 5-bean pods, which results in higher yield potential compared to original Roundup Ready® soybeans.  Thompson planted the technology in the Stewart™ Seeds brand.
  

  -- Seymour, Ind. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 9/30 - Roaring River, N.C.: Were still working on harvesting silage, need 4 more days of dry weather to finish. Oh well, after that we crank up the combine, on the farm the fun never ends, just a #DayinAg.
   
   
• 9/30 - Renick, W.Va.: See a chopping corn video. This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture."
  
   
  
   
• 9/30 - Texas Panhandle: See a sorghum harvest day, from sunrise to the evening. These photos was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture."
  

  -- Texas Panhandle (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 9/30 - Vardaman, Miss.: Watch a video of sweet potato harvest. This video was part of AgWeb's "A Day in Agriculture."
  

• 9/29 - Gratiot County, Mich.: Still cloudy and damp, checked our driest corn today...29% gonna be another late harvest like 2009!
   
   
• 9/29 - LaGrange, Ind.: My soybeans are green and have probably a good three weeks but looking at them they will make maybe 40-50 bushel. My fall seeded hay field is up out of the ground very nice and doing good
   
  
   
• 9/28 - Texas: “Our trees are dying!” Reports like this are coming from throughout the state, but don’t write off that shade tree or loblolly pine just yet, said a Texas AgriLife Extension Service expert. “It’s really a wait-and-see kind of a game,” said Dr. Eric Taylor, AgriLife Extension forestry specialist, Overton. “Just because a tree’s leaves have turned brown – or that the leaves have shed from the tree – doesn’t mean the tree is dead.” Trees respond to moisture stress and heat with natural defense mechanisms, and these responses vary from species to species, Taylor said.

• 9/28 - Lyon County, northwest Iowa: Good crop for sandy soil. Beans went 48. Corn came out at 16% moisture and made 150.
  
   
• 9/28 - Knox County, Mo.: My farmer decided to cut corn for silage, as the insurance review expected 60 bu./acre.  
  
   
• 9/28 - Barber County, Kan.: Wheat drilling has barely started here. Conventional tillers are struggling with choosing between drilling with rapidly depleting topsoil moisture and praying for rain, while no-tillers have marginal/fair moisture to establish a stand. Both are facing the fact of absolutely no subsoil to carry the crop into winter months. When digging, moisture is found in the area of 1" to 6" down and dry from there on out. Everyone is saying that if a stand is established and no more rain comes, the remaining crop will be dead by November. As I wrote a couple weeks ago - as expected; corn harvest has almost wrapped up with whole farm average on irrigated around 145 (usually 180+) and dryland at 0 (usually 60-100). (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
   
• 9/28 - Wabasha, Minn.: We just finished combining 140 acres of high moisture corn, yields were above average, moisture at 26 to 30, yields at 205 to 210 bu./acre adjusted to dry bushels.
  
   
• 9/28 - Allen County, Kan.: Rain finally made a measurable appearance last weekend to the tune of 1.25", received an additional 0.25" yesterday morning. Not enough to close the soil cracks, but enough to help the beans. Beans are starting to turn and drop leaves. Some plants are full of beans and then there are sections where there is nothing on them. Right now unsure of yield potential, but hopeful for as much as possible. There are also reports of worms on the beans with a fair amount of pod damage too.

  
  It is nice to have a break from the unrelenting overbearing high temperatures. Most of the corn is harvested and yields are all over the place -– from 0 bu./acre to a small section in a lower creek bed grossing 100 bu./acre. Biggest issue is aflotixin –- seems there is no consistency with the sampling and dockings are taking huge tolls on loads.  

  Trying to decide to invest in planting wheat, reports of La Niña resurgence coupled with the extensive drought in the region makes a decision even tougher to expense for planting and care for a wheat crop. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  

• 9/27 - Western Walsh County, northeast North Dakota: Our area received 2.6" of rain last week, but nice weather moved in and we have enjoyed a great run of beautiful harvest days. The wheat that we had left has lost some test weight, but the moisture levels are down to 15%-16%. Yield on the wheat seeded out until June 14 has been holding in the 45 to 50 bu./acre range. We should finish this week, if a stray rain shower stays away. During last week's rain and windstorm, our sunflowers blew over flat!
  
  The day after the rain, most of the custom combine crews loaded up and headed south to start on soybeans. Some farmers were left to scramble to find combines. Lots of late canola harvest going on in the northern tier of counties, with a pretty good crop. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
• 9/27 - Orange County, Ind.: 50% on corn, yield is 80% of five-year average. No beans cut yet.
  
  
   
• 9/27 - Montgomery County, Ill.: Harvesting corn today on 35 acres with the combine readings of 160 to 170 in the field. Positive surprise, to say the least, given the lack of rain this summer.
   

• 9/27 - Cedar Rapids, Iowa: View a time lapse from a grain cart. Video courtesy of http://lefebure.com/.
  

• 9/26 - Eau Claire County, Wis.: Harvest has not yet started.
  
   
• 9/26 - Washington County, southeast Iowa: Thought things weren't going to be quite as bad as we did in mid-August. Yield checks before combining looked decent. Started harvesting Friday and hopes started to fade quickly. First field was "good" at 155 to 165 bu./acre, then started second, bigger field and very disappointed at maybe 135. Only got to 135 by working in the best area of the field just to keep my attitude good for the rest of the weekend. Been a tough two years. At least this year we were able to have weed control. Makes it easier to combine, at least. Beans are not going to be fun, especially the early ones. Too hot for too long. Go 10-15 miles north (I-80), where they got at least periodic rains in July and August, to see any sort of good yields. Normally we are in the 180 range.
  
   
• 9/26 - Northeast Nebraska: What the first frost didn’t kill on Sept. 15, the frost on Sept. 21 did. All beans that were grass green are dead. Green pods are just drying up to nothing. Corn that froze lost a lot of test weight...took the first corn out on Sept. 23. 23% moisture and 54 test weight, too hot, too dry in September, then froze too early. Not a good year. Yield was 15% less than five-year average.
  
   
• 9/26 - Watobwan County, Minn.: Beans got hit hard with frost. Poor pod count from heat and the pods in the top two to three nods are done. Be happy with low 40s bu./acre. Corn took frost better but heat during pollination. Tip back ears kernel count of 15.2×28 on average. Hoping for low 150s. EVERYBODY STAY SAFE.
  
   
• 9/26 - Caldwell County, Mo.: Walked my beans today, lots of beans with one bean in the pod, still they will do good... My Best Friend Joe started cutting beans today. They were making 45 to 50 bushels, his corn he thought made 120, he said there were great spots and terrible spots. The pictures are of Joe cutting beans.
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 9/26 - Gordon County, Ga.: Things are busy this fall. We are in the process of planting winter canola, and will be planting oats, barley and wheat later this fall. We are 3/4 done with corn harvest and soybean harvest is two to three weeks away. Our sunflowers benefited from the most recent rain events and will be ready for harvest after the first frost. We have included pictures of canola crop last year at bloom and close to harvest. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  

  -- Gordon County, Ga. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   

• 9/26 - East central Iowa: Finally finished 2011 hay crop Saturday. Heard of a couple guys who started high moisture corn. (190 to 210 bu./acre. I assume that was dry bushels.) Corn was 25% to 30% moisture. I may be able to start the end of this week. The forecast changed from nice and sunny to chance of showers and cooler last Friday for this week. I thought beans would go this week, but not anymore.
  
  
   
• 9/26 - Grant County, Okla.: Corn, milo and beans are toast. Wheat was average. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   
• 9/26 - Barton County, Kan.: Corn was all chopped, beans 10 bu. or less, milo good north end of county, south end none, started planting wheat with small amount of subsoil moisture, not a good year. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   
• 9/26 - Thomas County, Kan.: We are planting wheat and it is DRY, about as dry as I can remember. There are a few spots of good moisture in NW Kansas, but there are a lot of dry ones. The dry land corn on our farm so far has been from 85 to 115, so not all is bad. I think that the real problem is coming next year, but as you all know, God will never send you more pain than you can stand. Hope all have a safe fall. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   
   
• 9/26 - Putnam County, Ohio: Recent rains did help the corn and soybeans and the crops should average close to normal.
  
  
   
• 9/26 - Knox County, Ill.: Harvested a 146.7 acre field, yield 204 bu./acre at 24% moisture. Dry moisture readout set in monitor at 14%.
  

  -- Knox County, Ill. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 9/23 - Livingston County, Ill.: Haven't started harvesting yet. You need to blow up the state that we choose, so we can click on each county. It is too bunched up.
  
   
• 9/23 - Kosciusko County, north central Indiana: 37 degrees this morning, light frost on the beans. Tonight is supposed to be colder. Beans in the southern part of the county gave up weeks ago due to lack of rain, nearly all leaves are dropped. Soybeans in the north half or those planted later are just starting to turn yellow. Need a couple more weeks without a harder frost. ¼" of rain yesterday should help the green beans and corn. Hoping for 40 bu./acre bean average and 150 bu./acre corn. Last year averaged 52 bu./acre beans and 194 bu./acre dry corn.

• 9/22 - Blue Earth County, Minn.: It froze the crap out of things here. I am tired of hearing how it didn't freeze. Get out of the concrete jungle in the cities and smell the silage. Our green beans are brown now.
  
   
• 9/22 - Bellevue, Iowa: Corn chopping is winding down. Saw two small fields that were combined. They look like they shut down early or were an early variety and didn't appear that it yielded very good (poor weed control). Beans will start next week. I finally found some corn that has black layered. I think high moisture corn will also start next week (hopefully, it sounds like we will be one of the last to start and last to finish again).the picture is of goosenecked corn that I think we will see a lot of this fall. Corn does appear to still look good. Heard of 200 bu./acre corn the county south of me.
  

  View from 60 feet up. We finished last silo on Saturday. -- Bellevue, Iowa   (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 9/22 - Logan/Menard counties, Ill.: Moving the auger around from bin to bin. Watching grain dump. Video courtesy of http://biggreencombine.com.
  

• 9/21 - Ward County, N.D.: All crops that have been harvested have been well below average yields. Wheat seems to be the most affected with yields 80% less than average for the area, canola yields are very poor and the peas did not get planted, the beans froze. To much rain, disease, hail, and severe weather. Areas of drowned out twice as big as est during acreage report deadline. Roads still not fixed. Access to fields is still a problem. Very poor harvest all around, Just got 2.25" rain yesterday. Where is USDA getting there production numbers? The acres are not there and the yield is not there either. In my opinion USDA is very high on production est. I see this from the seat of the combine... (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com) 
  
   
• 9/21 - Linn County, Kan.: Corn is making about 25 bu/acre and has Aflatoxin in it. Not good at all!
  
   
• 9/21 - Ward County, N.D.: HRSW in the area was 10-15 bu and winter wheat ran as high as 20 bu. Allot of prevent plant and some late planted soybeans went in. They all froze last week. Fields are black and turning grey now. More fields not planted here. Not much for winter wheat going in. Too much water resulted in the worst crops we have seen in years. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com) 
  
  
   
• 9/21 - Texas: Many parts of the state received from a trace to 4 inches of rain, but as welcome as the moisture was, people rushing to plant winter wheat or pasture may be setting themselves up for an expensive failure, according to a Texas AgriLife Extension Service agronomist. From Sept. 13 through Sept. 20, much of the state east of Interstate 45 received from 1 to 2 inches of rain, according the National Weather Service. Parts of the Panhandle and North Texas received similar amounts, as did San Antonio and surrounding counties. The Coastal Bend and South Texas areas had large pockets of 3 to 4 inches of rain.
  

  Ryegrass could be a less high-stakes gamble than other winter forages this year as it can be planted later and disked in. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Robert Burns) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 9/21 - Logan/Menard counties, Ill.: Bill gives a crop update while driving the combine in a field of corn. Video courtesy of http://farmandranchcountry.com.
  

• 9/20 - Eyre Peninsula, South Australia: We have had a severe week of weather for our crops. Field Peas and Faba Beans still flowering had there flowers blown off (70% have finished flowering) and if that didn't upset the growers enough, frost earlier wiped out 100% of some individual Pea crops. 90% of Canola is past the flowering stage as well. Growers are reporting Wheat and Barley has been tipped from the hot strong winds, up to 1/3 of the grain heads are useless. This is from individual growers reporting this. We are forecast to receive good rains next week from 27th onwards, but that forecast is a long way out. We have retreated from a possible fantastic year to just above average by our calculations. Also any rain now could be too late for the earlier crops. Harvest could only be 4-6 weeks away from starting for us.
  
   
• 9/20 - Hancock County, Ohio: Crops look excellent this should be a bumper crop if the frost holds out. Only a few beans have been harvested but I expect harvest to be well under way in 2-3 weeks. The Roundup 2 look really nice 4 beans to a pod.
  
   
• 9/20 - St. Clair County, southwest Illinois: Corn harvest is just getting going.  Moistures have been running from in the high teens to low 20’s for the most part on the early May planted corn.  Yields have been and will continue to be varied.  In general yields so far are a bit better than expected with much of the early may corn running in the 150-180 range.  Given that we received about 1.5" of rain since July 8 I think those yields are much better than what we would have seen with the genetics of just 15 years ago.  The corn planted the middle of May looks like it will be 10-30 less based on some headlands we shelled.  A lot of that will depend on the amount of greensnap in the field and from the looks of some fields I suspect there could be variances between varieties of 50+ bushels per acre.  The late May/early June corn will surely be less. 
  
  We have had nearly 3" of rain over the past 5 days which will help beans to an extent, but really came a couple weeks too late to make a significant impact on yields.  I think the early June planted beans still have a chance to be in the 40-50 bu range but I think the later planting the end of June and into mid-July will fall well below that.  I would think many of those fields will be in the teens to 30 bu. depending on rainfall.       
  
   
• 9/20 - Sanilac County, Mich.: June 5th planted plot! Frost alerts for next two days! Here are some before pictures........ Hopefully we dodge the severe bullet that could be coming. Video courtesy of eagerjeffrey’s YouTube channel.
  

• 9/19 - Lincoln County, S.D.: We had spotty rains this year and it shows. Sand ground is gone and 5% to 15% lost to too much water. 1.9 beans are turning and losing top leaves and 2.2 beans are just starting to turn. The rest turned black Friday after the frost. Yield will be determined after the combines roll. Corn guess from 200 bu. to 0 bu./acre, too uneven too even guess yield.
  
   
• 9/19 - Morrison County, Minn.: Crops got some frost last week. While out looking at the corn and soybeans, it looks like about half the canopy froze. Corn is still alive at the cobs and below, and the lower half of the soybeans are still alive. Got about 0.5" of rain today, which was welcome. The frost probably took 10% of the yield, which could be 20 bu. of corn and 6 bu. soybeans. Could be worse, I guess. East of the Mississippi River in this county, the frost killed everything.
  
   
• 9/19 - Richland County, Ill.: Started shelling corn on 9/14 with lower than expected moisture (15.2) and disappointing yields. Doing yield checks, I knew the heat and dryness were hurting the crop but expected the earliest corn to be the best. What we shelled so far was between 85 bu. and 100 bu./acre versus 160 bu. to 185 bu./acre last year. Beans look terrible because of no rain in august and are almost all ready. They just seemed to give up and die overnight. Finally, we have just received an inch of rain with more still coming. Good to settle the dust, just too late to help the crops.
  
   
• 9/19 - Caldwell County, Mo.: The picture is from last week. We drilled ryegrass into pasture, trying get some fall grazing. We got an inch of rain this past week, we had 38° also. Can't believe the bean price dropped. I am not one to sell something I don't have. I am not "contracting'' -- might get me divorced if I fail!
  

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 9/19 - Daniels County, Mont.: Finished seeding spring wheat June 5. Had some frost damage area. Farmers seeded until June 15 or later, major frost damage. Wheat turning white five to six days after freezing, thousands of acres. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 9/19 - Southwest Kansas: Wheat harvest, corn planting, soybean planting, farm life. Video provided by http://www.southwestff.com. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com) 
  
  
   
• 9/19 - Golden Valley, N.D.: Crops are below average, 25-30 bu. No rain since July 5. A lot of light test weight.
  
   
• 9/19 - Lebanon, Ind.: We started cutting beans today. They are running about 50 and 13%. Some has been shelled, but our corn just started to black layer. We are setting up our draper this year and we are starting to get used to it and starting to love it. Hope corn is about 150 and beans stay at 40's-50's.
   
   
• 9/19 - Barron County, Wis.: Corn grain yields generally follow corn silage yields. This would indicate that our area yields would be down 15%-20% from 2010 even before the hard freeze of Sept. 15. Soybeans and corn are pretty much nailed in every direction from here. I expect that with the frost damage, our ending yields will be lighter test weights and final numbers in the 30's for soybeans and in the 120-130 range for corn. Potato crop is poor, while the hay season was well above average.
  

  -- Barron County, Wis. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   
• 9/19 - Southeast Minnesota: We had a good frost. Some beans had started to turn while others had wilting leaves on the 16th. My beans dropped a foot. Field corn was close to maturity, so just hastened the process.
  
   
• 9/19 - Plymouth County, Iowa: Beans mostly green on the 15th and all brown on the 17th. My late corn mostly green, now all dead. We will never know how much yield was lost. But between the late planting, heat and now frost, it was not an ideal year. Heard on the radio the frost wasn't widespread. That makes me feel better. Temp was at 32° at 12:30 a.m. and 29° at 6:30 a.m. Dug some feedlot post holes yesterday and had a hard time augering dirt out of holes. Had to finish holes by hand because the dirt was like flour. We are going to have to have some rain and a lot of it to get soil moisture back. Thought I was 50% sold in corn and beans, but now maybe 75%.

• 9/16 - Boone County, Mo.: Well, I lowered my corn from 180 earlier to 120 and now the combine is reporting 40/75. Will start soybeans today, with any luck at all. I lowered them earlier from last year’s average of 58.6 to about 40, then to 30, and now I hope to get 10. Absolutely the worst crop I could have imagined! Thank God for crop insurance!
  
   
• 9/16 - Mower County, Minn.: The day after effects of frost yesterday morning are evident. Corn was finished by the frost and beans look to be killed halfway down. We are just 15 miles off the Iowa border.
  
   
• 9/16 - East central Minnesota: The beans are turning color here today. They are turning black after the hard freeze Wednesday night. We needed another two weeks on the beans and corn. Called my crop insurance and they said that thousands of acres were affected and most likely will be zeroed out. 
  
   
• 9/16 - Hamilton, Ohio: Started shelling corn on Sept. 14 because of stalk concerns. Ran about 60 acres with an average of 150 bu./acre. Yields anywhere from 0 bu. to over 200 bu./acre within the same field, with moisture averaging 20.5%. Pleasantly surprised with better corn and better stalks yet to run about one to two weeks away.
   

• 9/16 - Western Walsh County, northeast North Dakota: On my way home from a parts run last night, I noticed several pickups parked at the local tavern. Every farmer in there, including me, had a lot of harvest left, but we had all run up against high-moisture wheat and canola.  Big combine crews were parked in the fields...our late planting spring season is showing up now, with a harvest delay. Our wheat is running 45 to 50 bu./acre. Canola ranges 1700-2200 lb./acre. The big wheat crops of the past two years are not happening this year. Others have had some wheat down into the high 20's if they caught a heavy rain at the wrong time. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 9/16 - McLeod County, Minn.: The frost from two nights ago really took its toll on our crops. Yesterday while chopping silage, we could watch the beans start to look worse and worse throughout the day. By the end of the day, they looked real pathetic. Lots of freeze-drying for pods that were just beginning to fill. For as hard as it froze, we are looking at some lower test weights on our corn too. The damage is very widespread. It goes from southern Minnesota into South and North Dakota and Wisconsin. I talked with the local agronomist. We are thinking somewhere around a 30% reduction in bean yields from the frost for everyone within 50 miles. Don’t have much to report outside that.
  
   
• 9/16 - Morrison County, Minn.: We got nipped with some frost last night, but it shouldn't affect yields too much. Things looking pretty good!
  
   
• 9/16 - Perry County, Pa.: We had 12.5" of rain last week. We're hoping for some dry weather now to prevent ear mold. Overall it looks to be a decent harvest, especially the beans. Possibly 55-60 bu. in beans.
  
   
• 9/16 - Barber County, Kan.: Corn harvest has slowly started here. We are only picking irrigated corn; all the dryland was zeroed out by insurance. Irrigated yields have been all over the board. 125-140 will probably be average. Had a big well yield 186, while a shorter well a half mile away yielded 83. Have heard the same from locals - all the short wells have been under 100 yield (some under 50) while large wells are 120-180. Typically irrigated yields on large and small wells will range from 175-230 in our area on a normal year. Looking for yield on dryland beans around 5-10. Looking for yield on dryland milo from 20-45.
  
   
• 9/16 - Roberts County, S.D.: It was a solid freeze last night.
  
   
• 9/16 - Benson County, N.D.: Pinto beans are probably a total loss. Needed another 10 days. 800 acres down the drain. Hard hit.
  
   
• 9/16 - Barron County, Wis.: Had a hard freeze this morning. Thermometer had 30° at 4 a.m. and by 7:00 it was down to 27°. Don't think it will hurt the corn much, but the beans will take a hit on yield as they had just started turning yellow. Time to get the corn head on the chopper and start making corn silage.

  -- Barron County, Wis. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 9/16 - Posey County, southwest Indiana: Walked corn fields this morning, covered about half of our corn fields and came up with 350 acres that need to be replanted. After lunch will scout the other half. Large rains and cold temps are to blame. Some farmers will lose 50% to 100% of their corn crop that was planted to the rains and the large flooding river. With rains forecasted for all weekend, it looks like 10 days to two weeks before any field work will get done.
  
   
• 9/16 - Winnebago County, Iowa: Smells like silage out this morning. Got to 27° last night. Beans hurt bad, as most were still green. Corn was mostly far enough along, might hurt a little test weight.
  
   
• 9/16 - Northeast Nebraska: Everything had frost on this a.m. Beans were still grass green where they were irrigated. Dryland one had been dead and drying up for the last week...not a good end to the year.
  
  
   
• 9/16 - Nobles County, Minn.: Our growing season has come to an end this morning. We had enough frost yet at 7:30 a.m. that the kids had to clean their windows to go to school. I’m guessing that 75% of the crops were mature enough to handle it here, even though we are two weeks early for an average killing frost. Lots of silage being chopped and I'm guessing some early beans will go this weekend. Have a safe harvest, everyone.
  
   
• 9/16 - Franklin Parish, La.: Had good and bad corn yields, some cut 200 bpa down to 110 bpa. First soybeans cut 60 bpa. Just getting ready to cut some wheat beans. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  

• 9/15 - McLeod County, Minn.: Well, it froze very hard last night. My digital thermometer outside says 26°. Our beans needed at least two weeks without frost yet. The disaster crop of 2011 just got a whole lot worse!
  
   
• 9/15 - Montgomery County, Ill.: Beans starting to yellow but not halfway yet. Four weeks without rain. Rain may have helped yesterday and today. Hope for up to 40 bu./acre. Corn harvest next week. Expect 145 bu./acre.
  
   
• 9/15 - East central Iowa: The 2011 hay crop is almost complete. Some bean fields are really starting to turn, some have lost a few leaves. Most all of the corn is still a week from black layer (an odd field may  be mature). Guys chopping corn are having a lot of trouble with breakdowns because the corn is goosenecked and not cutting or feeding like normal (causing chains, sprockets and gearbox issues). Had scattered frost this morning.
  

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   
• 9/15 - Northeast Greene County, Iowa: Had 38° today. Will have black smelly crops tomorrow.
  
   

• 9/15 - Northern Coles County, Ill.: Corn crop is about what I expected, 120 to 160 bu./acre. We had 4/10" of much needed rain -- that puts us at about an inch since the end of June. The cracks in the field could swallow a golf ball.

  -- Northern Coles County, Ill. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 9/14 - Northwest Kansas: Started to harvest wet corn and the yields were about what we expected 85+ and these two half sections were hopefully some of our poorer corn. Started on another field and it is much better. We were lucky -- no hail and timely rains in our part of NW Kansas.
  
   
• 9/14 - Bon Homme County, S.D.: The crops look OK from the road. But step inside the field, the yield is definitely NOT there. The ears are very small.
  
   
• 9/14 - Pepin, Wis.: Beans are coming along very nice, most of the leaves are off. Looks like I will start combining around the 25th of September. I have found some early corn that has black layered. Yields on beans look like around 50 and corn around 190.
  
   
• 9/14 - Eyre Peninsula, South Australia: Eyre Peninsula is in the western half of South Australia and its country ranges from high rainfall 700mm to 280mm. (FYI, S.A. is the driest state on the driest continent.) Throughout the 2000's we had some shocking droughts and nearly sent some farmers to the wall. But the last two years, seasons have been kind and last year was a record breaker for S.A.

  
  This year started with a bang again and we were off to a flyer on the Eyre Peninsula, the rest of the state was either too wet or too dry. There were two schools of thought this year, some farmers went in early and those crops are looking good. Then there's the farmers who went in late looking for a good weed kill, and those crops will need a big finish to get over the line. Of late, the rains have stopped, since early August was the last decent rain event. There was good subsoil moisture for crops to call upon this season, which they would've sucked on a fair chunk of that by now, makes you wonder what is left?

  All in all, we at worst on the E.P. should be looking at an average year. I notice ABARE, our version of USDA, has pegged our wheat crop  at 26 mmt, some private analysts have it currently pegged at 24-25 mmt. I go with the later. Our spring can be severe and we are already experiencing warm windy days. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  

   
   

• 9/14 - Logan/Menard counties, Ill.: In this crop update, Bill talks about his field of irrigated soybeans. Video courtesy of http://farmandranchcountry.com.
  
  
   

• 9/14 - Henry County, Ohio: Six inches of rain from what was left of tropical storm Lee last week. Will help lots of beans that are still green or just turning. A few fields around that could be ran in the next ten days. Yield guess 25 bushel as they are very thin and short. The green fields could easily yield in the 50 plus range if they get ripe. Most corn planted in June has a long way to go. This will be a long harvest season.
  
  
   
• 9/14 - Union County, Ohio: Some beans are just starting to turn in the southern part of the county but none here. All the corn here was planted the first week in June and needs 4 weeks before it is safe from frost. But it does look excellent. Fingers crossed.
  
  
   
• 9/14 - Texas: Many agricultural producers in East Texas are feeling caught between a rock and a ‘hot’ place, according to Texas AgriLife Extension Service personnel. The agricultural losses from the extended drought are extreme. But added to those costs now are frequent wildfires which have destroyed fencing, hay supplies and barns, and scorched what sparse grazing there was left, said Aaron Low, AgriLife Extension agent for Cherokee County. "Talking with people who are more experienced with drought than I am, they’re anticipating that even it if starts raining right now, it’s going to be at least two years before our grasses are able to recover from this," Low said.

  Lack of water and lack of hay and grazing continued to force Texas livestock owners to sell out herds statewide. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Robert Burns) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 9/13 - Dickey County, southeast North Dakota: Not much rain of late. We were very wet in June and the first half of July and then nothing for moisture. Corn that survived the wind and hail is fine. The beans will be average because we just didn’t get that last rain and it’s been way above average for heat, we’ll be 10 bushels less than 2010. The best wheat yields were right at 40 bu/ac with the average at 25 bu/ac. I can’t figure out how USDA comes up with an average wheat yield of 41 bu/ac when that’s the top end? (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
   

• 9/13 - Hettinger County, N.D.: Spring wheat harvest is just wrapping up in our area, yields varied with 10-30 bushel an acre, the statement that rain makes grain was not true this year, to much disease and shallow roots, now we are dry on the topsoil so cant fire up the drills yet to put the winter wheat in. Have heard very similar yields on the spring wheat throughout the state. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   
• 9/13 - Western Winona County, Minn.: Beans starting to yellow and drop leaves. Corn in advanced milk stage with a few days left to maturity for 98 day corn planted before May 1. Both crops look great. I'm estimating 50 and 170 plus on the two crops. Our area has really never been dry, a real garden spot again this year.
  
   

• 9/13 - Marathon County, Wis.: Soybeans are starting to turn brown here and there but mainly drying up not mature. A few fields in with earlier varieties are 50% yellow. I am still finding blossoms. Probably doesn't matter. They are predicting frost for Wednesday and Thursday nights. Corn is predominantly dented if it freezes we will have light test weight corn. Need two weeks of good weather with no frost.
  

  -- Marathon County, Wis. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   

• 9/13 - Plymouth County, Iowa: Beans turning as of 9-9. Had some rain in August but either not enough or too late to help. Most late pods not filled and dropping or one small bean. Not like last year when the late pods on top filled completely. Had half in. rains 8-2 ,8-10,and an in. the last of August. Shelled corn today and all I have to say is it is the smallest kernel size I've ever seen.
  
   

• 9/13 - Yellowstone County, Mont.: Corn almost made, looks like no frost anytime soon , but you never know around here! Walked corn today should average 185-220 depends on day corn. We picked a few ears of 85 day corn 16 rows around and filled almost to tip, the 93-95 day corn yield looks a lot better.
  

  -- Yellowstone County, Mont. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

   

• 9/12 - McLeod County, Minn.: Hot dry weather has moved up to us now after the torrential rains this spring and early summer. Our shallow-rooted corn, and especially beans are frying up in a real hurry. Walked some of my fields yesterday and the pods are starting to fall off the beans. They have a couple weeks left to go.
  
  Doesn’t look good. On Wed and Thurs we have a good chance of seeing some frost. It would be a disaster for us. Just found out yesterday that McLeod and Renville counties had over 11,000 acres of PP combined. There is something I never thought I would say. Still baffles me where USDA got extra corn acres in MN.
  
   
• 9/12 - Day County, S.D.: Wheat harvest was looking good, but we ended up with half-filled heads due to extreme heat and a 30 bushel average. Soybean fields are burning up fast and some of the top pods are not filling. Yields are going to be reduced due to the extreme heat as well. We will be content with a 30 bushel average. Corn fields have some tipback, slight pollination issues and some smut. Yield estimates are 175-180 in the heavier soils, but the low spots where we had early season flooding suffered, giving us an estimated overall average of 120-125 bushels. The crops looked good from the road all season long, but once you get in the fields it’s a whole different story. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 9/12 - Wilbur, Wash.: Crops are all cut!  Quality was outstanding.  Some dockage due to foreign material was heard of.  Yields were very good as well. Winter Wheat seeding is going on now with some earlier seeding up and green!  All in all a good year to be a wheat farmer in WA State. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com) 
  
   

• 9/12 - Robeson County, N.C.: Finished corn last week with a surprising 105 av. Started beans today. Disappointing 30 bu. usually 45 to 50.
  
   
• 9/12 - Logan/Menard counties, Ill.: Harvesting corn field and showing the GreenStar monitor in John Deere combine. Displaying the yields and moisture. The pasture and cows. Follow our daily harvest. Video courtesy of http://biggreencombine.com.
  
  
  
   
• 9/12 - Putnam County, Ohio: Started chopping silage Tuesday, 15 tons per acre, checked at 124 bpa. 3"rain will stall us for a few days, should help later beans
  
   
• 9/12 - Henry County, Mo.: Just had two tenths of rain about 4:00. Shelled about 20 acres out of 115. The monitor was ranging from 30 to 150 with a lot of 70-80. Tried some down corn surprising test weight was 50. Yields are still pretty good. Beans look awesome we fertilized real heavy this year looks it will pay off. A few podworms and grass hoppers but not enough to spray yet.
  
   
• 9/12 - Caldwell County, Mo.: This past week we seeded rye grass into existing pasture trying to get some good fall grazing, even though we gotten some rain. Pasture are getting short. Beans are really turning, Neighbor started shelling corn Saturday, hadn't heard about any yields yet.

  -- Caldwell County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 9/12 - Stillwater, Okla.: SUNUP's Dave Deken talks with Oklahoma State University's Canola Specialist, Josh Bushong about what producers need to be thinking about with dryer than normal conditions at canola planting time.
  

• 9/9 - Lancaster County, Pa.: Whatever happened to normal? First we had a wet spring, then July was dry with scorching heat and humidity. Now we have come full circle and temps are cool and we have been inundated by tropical storm Irene giving 5" of rain and now one week later tropical storm Lee gives us another 8" of rain with historic river flooding. Corn silage harvest was just getting started and now we have a mess. Manure storages are full and fields are a soggy swamp. We need a break!
  
   
• 9/9 - Holt County, Mo.: The mismanagement of the Missouri River and the environmental interest groups pushing the Army Corps of Engineers to buy our land for fish and wildlife habitat led to the fourth flood in five years for much of our farm ground.
  
   

• 9/9 - Jackson County, east central Iowa: Silage baling hay in east central Iowa. Weather has been great. A lot of hay has been cut down and the weather sounds like it should hold for the next 3-5 days.
   

• 9/8 - Independence, Ark.: Corn 40 bu. dryland/150 bu. irrigated. Soybeans looking good but having to water late to fill pods. Rice yield looks to be down because of hot weather at flowering.
  
   
• 9/8 - Western Oklahoma: Wheat was near disaster this summer -- yields 20%-35% of 2010 yields. Summer crops all near disaster -- I expect only 10% of cotton planted to be harvested. No dryland corn, milo, beans or sesame will harvest. Range conditions pitiful -- probably 70% of cattle sold out of area. Fall 2011 wheat crop in serious trouble without rain soon. DROUGHT bad in western and SW Oklahoma. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 9/8 - Logan/Menard counties, Ill.: We'll see how the corn yields with very little rain. Combine is ready. Setting up the auger to the grain bin. Video courtesy of http://farmandranchcountry.com.
  
  
   

• 9/8 - Lincoln, Kan.: North of me, crops survived the heat well. South of me, the drought and heat were devastating to the crops. Corn failed, beans failed, sorghum failed. I70 seemed to be the border between rain and drought. Everyone had heat, just that the crops hung on better with the moisture. Big variations in yields here.
  
  
   
• 9/8 - Freeborn County, Minn.: Crops look decent. Heat took its toll in July and August. 150-160 bu./acre corn, 50-52 bu./acre beans from early scouting. Silage cutting just starting. Third crop hay cutting coming up short of expectations.
  
  
   
• 9/8 - Texas: Cotton is a "mixed bag" in the Panhandle and South Plains, according to Texas AgriLife Extension Service personnel. Most dryland cotton has failed, and in some areas growers have given up on partially irrigated cotton as well. Also, there have been reports of odd plant development, most likely due to heat stress and lack of moisture. Read more about the Texas cotton crop.

  Row-watered cotton was doing better than some center-pivot irrigated cotton in some areas of the Southern High Plains. Most cotton in the Southern High Plains is subsurface drip or center-pivot irrigated, according to Dr. Mark Kelley, Texas AgriLife Extension Service cotton specialist, Lubbock. (Texas AgriLife Extension Service photo by Dr. Mark Kelley) (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

• 9/7 - Jackson County, east central Iowa: We started cutting last of hay crop for 2011 Tuesday. Some is 2nd crop, some is 3rd crop and some is 5th crop. We received 2" of rain on Saturday. Corn chopping is in full swing. Corn is 1/2 to 3/4 milkline and starting to show some signs of turning, with diseases starting to show up in some fields. Beans still look real good and are also starting to show signs of turning. It will be 3-4 weeks before any combines will be rolling here if weather holds (with the exception of high moisture corn).
  
  
   
• 9/7 - Howard County, Iowa: The fun has stopped for us.
  

  -- Howard County, Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
  
   

• 9/7 - Arthur, Ill.: Farm Journal's Darrelll Smith -- "I’m amazed at what this field is yielding, considering what the crop has been through," says J.D. Kuhns of Arthur, Ill. The field was averaging 175 bu. per acre, although it had received only 0.4" of rain since June 23 and endured many nights when temperatures refused to fall below 80°F. Kuhns combined a small amount last week and began harvesting seriously on Labor Day. "If all our fields yield this well, I’ll be elated," he says.
  

  -- Arthur, Ill. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

   

• 9/6 - West central Iowa: What a year! It’s been one weather event after another! First the cold during planting. Then we got hit with severe heat in July. Then came the baseball sized hail. Now last week we had 70 mph winds. Corn that survived all this looks great, but we have 400 acres that didn't fare so well with hail. We plan to start harvest next week on those acres.
  
   
• 9/6 - Montgomery County, Iowa: Two weeks ago, hail went through our area and damaged at least half of the county. On our farm we have 1,000 acres or so flattened by wind or hail. Guessing 300 hailed completely out and won't have to combine it, the rest we will start combining in a week or so when it is under 20%.
  
   

• 9/6 - York County, Pa.: Hurricane Irene flattened some corn. Early yields are coming in 30% below normal in corn and some worse off than that. Later planted corn looks a lot better. Just too dry and way too hot for the early corn. Beans look to be about average yield.
  
   

• 9/6 - Muscatine County, Iowa: I'll be harvesting when the moisture content is low enough. I'm guessing the end of September. Maybe later.
  
   

• 9/6 - Alamance County, N.C.: Crops look good. Rain has been real spotty. Some guys had plenty and some burned up. We have been lucky.
  
   
• 9/6 - Mahaska County, Iowa: We will probably start cutting some group 1.9 soybeans by the 12th of September. The rains that we got Aug. 29 and Sept. 3 will help the group 3 soybeans finish.
  
   

• 9/6 - Reno County, Kan.: We were supposed to have a 50% chance of rain today. Best chance in a long time. Front went through with no rain. It did build up on east of us but looked spotty on radar -- not a line of storms. I haven’t put down any fertilizer yet and didn’t want to till I see rain, but we're getting so close to planting time and I don’t want to get there and then have to spend a week running fertilizer before I can plant, so I’m thinking about doing some next week. Very stressful trying to decide whether to spend many many thousands of dollars on fertilizer with no moisture to even get wheat sprouted, let alone keeping it alive if it does come up. Seven-day forecast has no rain chance at all in it. Soybeans and milo are toast. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 9/6 - Sumner County, Kan.: No corn to harvest, most green chopped or baled. Soybeans mostly toasted. Milo will yield very little. Prospects to plant wheat are not good. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
   

• 9/6 - Clay County, Ark.: Corn is off about 15% yieldwise, still feel blessed. Tough year for it. Soy looks very good if irrigated, dryland is toast. Have cut about 125 acres. Corn yields vary from 175 to 190.
  
   
• 9/6 - Hartley County, Texas: 500 acres irrigated, 120 bu./acre. Last year made 235 bu./acre.
  
   

• 9/6 - Montgomery County, Mo.: Hot and dry. Early corn is going to be fair but low test weight. Late and replant corn is pretty bad, with serious pollination problems. Beans will be done very soon without rain. Possibly worst bean yields since mid 1980s if no rain soon.
  

  -- Montgomery County, Mo. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

   

• 9/2 - Benton County, Minn.: Crops look horrible (too much rain, not enough good drainage). Tile plow is coming Tuesday on my prevent plant acres. Done planting Producer's and Pioneer seeds for good! Not maturing and smut on the ears. My "other" corns will at least make very good silage with decent ears.
  
   
• 9/2 - Logan County, Ill.: I have 20 acres planted on April 16th that will make 200 or better. The rest of my corn was planted May 16th and later, I will be lucky to make 150! The high 90 degree heat while pollinating really cut my yield. 
  
   

• 9/2 - Pipestone County, Minn.: Corn varies from a nice roasting ear in the bottoms to 1/4 milk line on the higher ground. We really need a warm September. Early beans are starting to turn. Later beans were sprayed for aphids a second time today.
  
   

• 9/2 - East central Iowa: I went to the Farm Progress Show Wednesday and came to a couple of conclusions:  1. East central Illinois needs rain (cracks in parking lot could have swallowed car keys, cell phones, etc.).  2. Everything is getting too big and too expensive (in my opinion). A crop adjuster did a yield check on a marginal farm that I'm going to chop for silage and came up with 145 bu./acre. Corn was 1/2 milkline and yield could be a little higher or lower. We received  0.8" of rain on Tuesday afternoon.
  

  -- East central Iowa (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

   

• 9/1 - Prairie County, Ark.: Beans look good until you take a close look at them. They dropped a lot of blooms when we had the hot weather. We are having to spray for worm. The worms are eating holes in the pods. Rice harvest has started and yields are down.
  
   
• 9/1 - Brown Couny, Minn.: Corn tough start, replant 15%, some green snap, guessing 150 bu., last year 190+. Beans came up good, hoping for 45 bu., last year we had 52 bu. We need some rain and good weather through September and October. Hope for the best.
  
   

• 9/1 - Hoople, N.D.: Watch a John Deere 9630T with 16 bottom JD plow turning wheat stubble in Hoople, N.D. Video courtesy of slimfarms. (Read more wheat-related comments at AgWeb's www.VirtualWheatTour.com)  
  
  
   

• 9/1 - Wright County, Minn.: Wet spring, planted a majority around June 1. It rained moderately to excessive all summer. The sand ground has a once-in-a-lifetime crop on it. The heavy ground suffered from too much rain. It definitely paid to use an "N-Serve" type product this year. We expect corn and soybean yields to be above average: 175 bu. and 55 bu., respectively.
  
   

• 9/1 - Beaufort County, N.C.: We had 16" of rain and 80 mph winds that lasted for 17 hours.
  

  -- Beaufort County, N.C. (Have any photos of the crops on your farm? E-mail (CropComments@agweb.com) them to AgWeb and have them posted on Crop Comments! Be sure to include a caption.)

  
   

• 9/1 - Henry County, Mo.: Severe drought in central, southern and eastern parts of the county. Some corn being harvested now, making from 10 bu. per acre in the drought part of the county to 90 bu. in the northeastern part of the county, where they got rain. We haven't started harvesting corn yet, but the estimate is 20 bu. Beans are holding and starting to bloom with some rainfall. We're waiting to see if they fill out.
  
  

• 9/1 - Caddo Parish, La.: This Week in Louisiana Agriculture's Kristen Oaks travels to Caddo Parish to see how extreme heat and drought are affecting corn and cattle in northwestern Louisiana.