IARN — “One-quarter of the corn for grain has been harvested in Iowa,” as of October 4th, according to the weekly Crop Progress report, out from USDA-NASS. The current harvest pace is “three weeks ahead of last year and 12 days ahead of average.” Dry soil conditions, as well as other factors helped boost harvest, according to Chris Souder, DEKALB Asgrow regional agronomy lead for Iowa.
“We’re seeing some regions as high as 50-percent complete on corn harvest. Normally we see about 10-percent harvested this time of year. A couple reasons we’re running ahead of schedule have been due to the quick start this spring. Growing degree units through early months of the season were average, but the drought conditions we started to experience mid-July accelerated this crop to early maturity,” Souder says.
Midwest producers received “a variety of results,” induced by numerous challenges throughout the growing season.
“The main challenges we saw in 2020 have been: Multiple strong wind events throughout the season, drought conditions, and growing rootworm pressure. All of these events are putting pressure on yield this fall, as well as late season standability, so we encourage growers to continue to monitor and prioritize harvest to maximize bushels in the tank,” Souder says.
DEKALB offers “strong genetic traits,” and “strong agronomic traits.” The company recently introduced many new products for the 2021 growing season.
“We’re excited about the robust lineup of new Dekalb corn products for 2021. The Dekalb brand is offering 23 new products, featuring exclusive genetics and strong agronomic traits,” Souder says. “These new products along with many other top performing Dekalb products come seamlessly integrated with Acceleron seed applied solution with enhanced disease control to protect farmers investment and that comes at no additional cost to our growers.”
Story courtesy of the Iowa Agribusiness Radio Network.
Photo by Dustin Hoffman
