On day four of the 2022 Pro Farmer Crop Tour, morning found team leads Chip Flory pulling crop samples in Minnesota while Brian Grete was making his way into Iowa from Illinois.
“I’m finding more consistent crops here (near Waterloo, Iowa) than we saw in Indiana and Ohio but no real wow factor,” Grete told Davis Michaelsen, guest host of AgriTalk, on Thursday. “Iowa is going to have a really good crop, just not as good as last year.”
Grete said he was also encouraged by the corn crop he sampled in Illinois on Wednesday.
“We saw a 190.71-bushel corn average in Illinois. That’s down from the 196-bushel average we sampled in Illinois in 2021 but above the three-year average of 185.6 bushels,” he said.
“No baseball bats this year?” Michaelsen asked.
“They’re out here,” Grete replied. “There are some heavy ears. When you pull them off the stalk, that’s what gives you that baseball bat-like feel.”
With the Illinois soybean crop, Grete said scouts’ samples on Wednesday averaged 49.7 bu. per acre.
“Soil moisture ratings are up, which will help the soybeans,” he said. “The pods are there, and they’ll plump up. We just need good finishing weather—adequate sunshine and rain, and they’ll be fine. It’s a very good crop in Illinois, just depends on what weather we get between now and harvest as to yield outcome.”
More insights on the Illinois crop are available here: Corn Prices Chug Higher on Disappointing Pro Farmer Crop Tour Findings
Are Farmer Expectations Holding Up?
Chip Flory dropped in on the phone conversation and asked Grete whether what he saw in Illinois corn and soybeans lined up with the USDA report released on August 1.
“I’m trying to gauge what you saw against expectations in the August 1 survey,” Flory said. “Do you think farmer expectations (in Illinois) have changed?”
“Very little,” Grete replied. “For the most part, I’d say farmer expectations are about the same now as they were at the beginning of the month.”
With weeks to go before harvest, however, there’s plenty of time for those expectations – and the crops – to change.
Grete added that the best analysis of this year’s data will be to compare state-by-state results to past Pro Farmer Crop Tour data, with close attention to the percentage changes. You also need to factor in the historical difference for each state, he encouraged.
“We know the corn yield calculated during Tour will be different than USDA’s final yield for each state,” said Grete, Pro Farmer Newsletter editor. “On average since 2001, the Tour yield has been 6.3 bu. above USDA’s final national average corn yield.”
In The Home Stretch
In Minnesota, Flory was about halfway across the state this morning and had stopped in Blue Earth county to talk.
“North of where I’m at right now, I think scouts are looking at consistency in corn samples from field to field to field, between 190 to 210 bushels, and they’re not really seeing many of the outlier ears,” Flory told Michaelsen.
“I haven’t run into that consistency yet,” he added. “I’m on one of the southern (Minnesota) routes and am not seeing that consistency between fields in the samples I’ve pulled so far.”
In the three corn samples Flory had checked, he described them as having “one good ear, one so-so ear and one dud because of pollination that didn’t happen with the kernels at the end of the ear.”
On the other hand, he said, “I pulled one 230 bu. sample here, so we’re seeing a mix.”
Grain length of the ears he checked were a bit shorter than he liked to see. He attributed that to higher plant populations of 33,000-plus farmers planted last spring.
“Here in Minnesota, they tend to push population a little harder because the growing season isn’t as hot here as in Nebraska or even southern Iowa,” Flory said. “If you end up seeing a grain length that’s a bit shorter than what we had in Iowa but a bigger yield, it’s likely because there’s just more ears out here per acre.”
Currently, the bean crop in southern Minnesota looks good to Flory, but he has some concerns.
“One thing I noticed on my first and second stops in southern Minnesota is you could see Sudden Death Syndrome (SDS) starting to show up in the beanfield. Those fields have a ton of potential, but the SDS is going to move that crop along,” he said.
Since those stops, Flory said he’s been paying closer attention to all the soybeans fields he drives by.
“The soybean crop is not without its issues, and the corn crop is not without its issues, but boy, there are good corn and soybean crops here,” Flory said. “We just need to get them home.”
The Tour concludes tonight in Rochester, Minn. You can join the meeting or tune in at 8 p.m. Central for a 15-minute overview of the results and crop report: Register to attend
Read more coverage of the 2022 Pro Farmer Crop Tour.
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