Planting progress has varied region by region across Indiana. It could be argued that Northeast Indiana has been hit the hardest by rain events this spring, halting planters and leaving farmers waiting ever so patiently. Pioneer agronomist Lance Shepherd says he’s received about 9 inches of rain since the beginning of April!
“Thanks to the sand ground to the north in Steuben County that’s really pulling their weight, they’re probably around 70% to 80% complete, whereas there’s a band basically running north of Wabash toward DeKalb County, and as you move east it gets a lot wider, that are probably 1% to 2% complete. So, a big variation throughout my geography. But I would say that the majority of the area is less than 30% complete.”
So, it begs the question- do we start thinking about changing to earlier maturities? Shepherd says that, for now, let’s stick to the original plan.
“Even some of the fuller season stuff that we can plant in Northeast Indiana, such as 113 to 111 days, we should still reach black layer prior to our first frost, which on average is October 20th. So, I would continue to go forward with plan A up here until the latter part of May, meaning Memorial Day weekend. And I would even say that we can push it until the calendar switches to June. Once the calendar switches to June we will have to consider switching over to earlier maturities.”
If the time comes to consider plan B, get in touch with your Pioneer representative by visiting pioneer.com/findmyrep. Hear the rest of my conversation with Shepherd below.
