Final day of the 2024 Pro Farmer Crop Tour had us starting at Greene IA on another split route. The crew today was Dan Sturgill at the wheel, Li Xuan Tan as statistician and me along for the ride. The day went by very quickly. We worked in a businesslike manner and before we knew it, we’d pulled 8 samples for the day. We were in the IA counties of Floyd and Mitchell in crop reporting district 2. On the MN side, we sampled in the counties of Mower and Dodge all district 9.
On our route today we saw an IA crop that lived up to my expectations in many respects. Our IA route average corn yield was 188 bu./acre with a high of 206 in Mitchell Co. and a low of 153 bu./acre in Floyd Co. After watching our corn crop in SC MN that struggled all season and seeing this crop today, it made me happy for them after sampling the disappointing crop they had last year.
On the SE MN part of our route, the pattern was much the same. The high was 220 bu./acre in Dodge Co. with a low of 165 bu./acre in the same co. Being a rain gauge observer for the MN Climatology Working Group, I also noticed many times over the course of the growing season that they had missed the excessive rainfall we received. No surprise there. Maturity comes into question however as there were many samples not denting yet. Temps today felt like September, and it will take all of September for those fields to mature.
Our soybean pod counts had much the same consistency we’d encountered the past three days. On the IA portion of the route today our 3’x3’ measurement averaged 1363 pods. The high was in Mitchell Co. at 1590 pods and the low was also in Mitchell Co. with 1186 pods. Relative to the last 3 days, beans were slightly less mature. Given the warmer days forecast and the decent soil moisture, they should finish fine.
On the MN side of the border, there was more optimism in our soybean samples. Apparently, the rains had visited those fields in a timely fashion and weren’t excessive. Our range in the 3’x3’ went from a high of 1771 in Mower Co. with a low of 638 in Doge Co. The route average was 1203, not bad all things considered. Soybean maturity was largely later R5 to R6. No guarantees but most of this crop should get under the wire when it comes to frost. It also should be able to fend off the soybean infestations present in some fields. Heavier pressure than we’ve seen in recent years, but the clock is ticking. The cool day today may start sending the signal that it’s nearing time to move to buckthorn, their overwintering host.
For the 21st year, I’d like to thank our sponsors for this year’s Crop Tour and to Brian Grete for allowing me to serve as Tour Consultant for one more year. I wasn’t sure I’d do it again after making it through the last one but here I am.
I’d also like to thank Dan Sturgill from Piqua OH for driving on our route and putting up with all my boring stories. The days were long, and we ground through them the best that a dairy farmer, a sheep farmer, and a couple former 4-H members could. Hopefully his harvest is a successful and profitable one.