Rainfall has been hard to come by for many areas of the Hoosier state. Specialty Hybrids Dealer Bill Schwieterman says that’s been the case in his territory from Fort Wayne down to Winchester on the eastern side of the state.
“But there’s still a big crop out here, if that makes sense, and there’s still a lot of potential. I think that we’re looking forward to getting into this crop, but I think some of our top end has maybe come off here with the heat and a lack of rainfall. Hopefully there are some storms coming here this week that are going to help finish this crop well, but overall, we do have a very nice crop coming on.”
He says the corn crop isn’t made yet and rains would still be beneficial.
“You know there’s definitely some of that really early April planted that maybe that milk line is moving past that half point, but I’ve been in a lot of fields and looked at a lot of corn, so when we see that milk line less than halfway down, I think rainfall can still have a big impact. A lot of these new genetics, we just have a different amount of kernel depth and size that it produces than what it was 15 years ago. So, there’s definitely an opportunity to take a hybrid and instead of it being 90,000 kernels to make a bushel, if we get some good rainfall here to finish out, maybe hold that tip-back from tipping back anymore, then maybe we can get closer to that 80,000 kernels to make a bushel or 75,000, which would be ideal.”
Schwieterman says harvest may begin in the middle of September. He believes some will try to shell corn early to take advantage of local basis opportunities around his territory. You can hear my full interview with Schwieterman below.
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