Grain prices continued to slide o Wednesday, including the Kansas City wheat futures. It followed the early results of the Kansas Wheat Tour, which produced some surprises.
45 people from 13 states spent Tuesday and Wednesday checking yields in hundreds of fields across central and Western Kansas. This is the 63rd annual Hard Winter Wheat Evaluation Tour by the Wheat Quality Council.
The tour turned virtual last year due to COVID.
Scouts say the crop is behind schedule in terms of development, along with pockets of disease, drought and freeze damage. According to USDA’s NASS, 15% of Kansas winter wheat is rated poor to very poor, while 54% is considered good to excellent.
Scouts on the 1st day of the Wheat Quality Council tour projected an average HRW wheat yield of 59.2 bu. per acre for northern Kansas. This was the highest figure for Day 1 of the tour dating back to 2000 & well above the 2015-2019 average for the area of 41.9 bu. per acre.
— Pro Farmer (@profarmer) May 19, 2021
Those statistics are in line with what scouts ultimately reported after the first day, finding an average yield of 59.2 bushels to the acre. That’s well above the previous three years of day-one totals, and tour leaders say it’s for sure the biggest number since 2011, and possibly the biggest day-one yield average ever.
“This is a snap shot of this wheat crop at this point in time most of what can happen between now and harvest is bad but this number is hard to ignore we counted heads today for most of that and that makes the number that much more accurate than if your counting tillers so it was a big day,” says Aaron Harries,VP of Research and Operations for Kansas Wheat.
Earlier this month USDA updated its predictions for the Kansas wheat crop, calling for an average of 48-bushels per acre and 331-million bushels in total production, both higher than last year.
Wednesday the tour travel along the western edges of the state including dipping into northern Oklahoma.
Some of those areas have seen up to 8-inches of rain in the last 10-days.
