Northwest, Iowa — Harvest season is underway and farmers are working hard to get their crop out of the fields.
This year is especially stressful for many farmers with the many hardships being faced this 2020 harvest season, and Joel DeJong, a Field Agronomist in NW Iowa, as well as a field specialist, says that this is a strange harvest season due to harvesting early.
(as said) “Well, we certainly have an earlier start than most years. Normally it’s the first of October before you get much of a start, and we’ve had a lot of the soybean crop really get harvested in the last week.”
DeJong says yield reports have varied from field to field.
(as said) “Yield reports have been extremely varied. I’m hearing reports from in the teens in poor soils, to up into the eighties.”
One of the reasons for the variation is due to the drought that has been around in Iowa. Also, sandy soil can be to blame for some of the low yields, since higher yields have a long history of using manure and timely rainfalls. DeJong says that the total yield is down from last year, but it’s not all bad.
(as said) “The range is fairly big, but what I’m hearing, on average, it’s not as good as last year, but it’s still better than maybe what you would think, with the lack of rainfall that we had through much of Northwest Iowa this year.”
Harvest hasn’t ended yet, so we will see what the final yield numbers are.
DeJong also reminds residents to be on the lookout on roadways, for oncoming farm implements and to be aware of them.
