Harvest winding down

Ryan Hiser

It has been unbelievable how long the weather has held. We haven’t really experienced a whole lot of damp or wet conditions. I can’t believe that we were able to get the beans off as fast as we were for as late as they were planted. Corn is coming off pretty well. The ground is dry so we’re not worried about compaction issues or rutting up fields. We’ve got about all 290 acres to go roughly. 

Soybeans were kind of disappointing. Yields were just based on the conditions we had. We were just fortunate we had a crop, but in some ways exceeded a little bit of my expectations. I was preparing for the worst. Most of the crop managed to be in the mid 40s to low 50s so I think we did all right for what was there, the conditions and how many times we had to replant it. Corn wise, we’re really just getting into the great stuff right now. In our worst corn, some of it that was absolutely terrible, I’m not going to lie. There were deer eating into it there was beaver getting into it — you name it, everything happened to that corn, and there were still 200-bushel spots in it.

If you give us a good week with this dry weather they’re calling for, I think we can pretty much hammer everything out. The biggest problem right now for us and for some of the people in the area is going to be storage.

A huge concern as of right now is we definitely need a rain in this area. Don’t light a match because there have been a couple fires that have gotten pretty big lately in local areas. There a fire in the area the other day that almost took out half a field. Fortunately for us, we’re on the wetter end of the county, so we’re doing pretty well at this point, but we need a rain just like everybody else.

It was a challenging year, but let’s face it, farming is not for the faint of heart. You’ve got to roll with the punches and keep going.

Kurt Wyler

The last few weeks we couldn’t have asked for better weather to harvest. There have been a few rainy days but for the most part, it’s been pretty warm and dry. We are really liking the sunshine here. The few rains we have had haven’t kept us out of the field. The rains gave the dryer a little chance to catch up and by the time we’re able to look at the equipment and get it greased up, we’ve been able to get back to rolling. We are about halfway done with corn now and for the most part, yields have been very good.

Some of the first corn we shelled was maybe carrying a little more moisture than what we were expecting. All the corn does seem to be a little tougher this year than what we dealt with last year, but a lot of what we’re in now is somewhere around the 180- 190-range. There are still a lot of crops in the fields around this area, both corn and beans, but in the last week a lot of lot of crops came off pretty quick. 

We are seeing a little bit of a hold up in the dryer with the corn that’s over 20% moisture. If we can keep it below 20%, the dryer can keep up with us. Luckily, we have a pretty large wet bin so we can hold 10,000 bushels in there so that’s what’s really helping us out on the dryer side. 

For the most part, corn yields have been very strong, maybe a little better than what we anticipated with what it’s been through this year. We still have a lot of bottom ground left as well. The bottom ground we’ve run so far should be around a 230 average. On the hills we have noticed some variation, somewhere in the 180- to 200-bushel range. There are just a few spots here and there that seem like, whether it was the wet weather early or maybe the dry weather, it seems to affect the yield.  

Nathan Birkemeier

Things are going really well. A lot of guys in this area are finished up. Yield averages are definitely up for this area. 

We’re getting into our corn and we’ve got some double-crop beans that we’re going to jump into maybe the later part of the week. Hopefully in a couple weeks we’ll be done. The soybeans were really surprising. As tall as they were, it looked like everything was going to be amazing. The highs definitely were close 75 and a lot of times we’re running 75 for a long stretch, and then with water spots and water damage we really took a beating this year. In low areas, we’re looking at 45 to 50 bushels an acre. For an average for the whole field, you’re probably in that 55 to 60 bushels an acre for an average from corner to corner, not taking out this wet spots. We actually do a test plots for Seed Genetics Direct soybean testing and a corn test. We got the soybean plot off and the number that won the plot did 82 bushels per acre. We’re really happy with those numbers, especially with this year with the extra rain we got. 

We harvested the corn plot too. We don’t have those numbers together yet, but the corn plot did really well too. We’re really happy to be able to hit those numbers this year and we’re always trying to be more consistent every year.

Corn for us is doing really well. We had a field with some of our better dirt averaged 195 bushels from corner to corner. Those are really good numbers for us on an average. There are going to be guys that definitely hit the 230s and 240s. 

We’re probably two weeks away from being done. If everything stays nice, we’ll finish up before Thanksgiving which is always a nice place to be. 

Joe Everett

 We actually should be finishing up today. We’ve been hitting the corn really hard.

I think we’re finishing up a little bit early just because we’ve had so much good weather. Our combine really never stopped. It’s maybe stopped a day here or there, but we’ve really pushed right through. This weather has been amazing to just get harvest wrapped up.

 We got started maybe roughly a week later than normal and we had some green beans that slowed us up in the beginning. Ever since that, though, we pushed through. The corn has dried down really well. It has progressed really fast not having to run everything through the dryer.

In what we’ve harvested, we haven’t seen really much of anything in terms of stalk problems. I’ve heard a lot about vomitoxin in the area but we’ve been really good and quality’s been good. We got a little bit nervous there Saturday when we had some pretty crazy winds coming through like in most of Ohio, but our corn stood really well. I think a lot of that goes to us doing aerial application of fungicides. I think that really helped plant health stay strong though the season and through harvest.

 We’re holding out in that 220 to 230 range pretty strong so I think that’s probably where we’ll finish on the corn. This corn was tested throughout the season but you know we always say the hybrids every year just keep getting stronger. And we’re putting more research into our crops and trying to do everything we can just to keep our plants healthy and keep them going and try to maximize yield every year.