Northwest Iowa — It’s about midway through the growing season — a great time to get a crop update from an expert.
Iowa State University Extension and Outreach Crop Field Specialist Joel De Jong tells us that it’s kind of a mixed bag in northwest Iowa.
As far as maturity, many cornfields in northwest Iowa are beginning to tassel.
De Jong says that the dry area has been expanding.
The southern third of the four-county area is now showing up as “abnormally dry” on the US Drought Monitor, with a little corner in southwest Sioux County showing as “moderate drought.”
In addition to the precipitation issue, De Jong says something else is becoming a concern as well.
He encourages farmers to check their corn, especially if corn was the crop in the field in the previous year.
Also, De Jong says the first cutting of hay was pretty decent for yield, and the second cutting was also what he called “fairly decent.”
