2023 Between the Rows

Lawrence Onweller

We had about a week in April to get stuff planted early. If you missed that window then that put you well into May because of the rains. That corn planted in May just did not want to dry down and it took a long time to harvest. With the dryer it takes twice as long to take twice as much moisture out. Typically, we should be in the 18% moisture range and we were in the 24% moisture range. 

We were extremely dry early, but when the corn is knee high, it doesn’t take all that much moisture. And then we got our July and August rains like we have the previous 2 years, so that makes 3 years in a row we’ve gotten really good rains in July and August. That’s what really makes a good yield. With it being dry earlier, we didn’t have hardly any insect pressure or disease pressure until later on after when we started getting the rains.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

It is going slow. The corn planted in May isn’t drying down. It’s still running 24% moisture. The yields are good, but we’re burning through a lot of gas and that part is going slow. The moisture in the corn just doesn’t want to drop, especially the fuller season corn. It just takes a long time to take twice as much moisture out and that’s literally what you’re doing when you’re harvesting 24% corn, you’re taking almost double the amount of moisture out.

With the weather, you’re able to harvest part of the day and then do field work part of the day. We’ve had sprinkles — no large rains in the last couple of weeks — just intermittent rains that haven’t really slowed down harvest. 

We’re seeing a lot of the corn yield in the 220s. That’s really good and the last 3 years it’s been like that.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

We had quite a few rains last week — and around 2 inches in the last 10 days — so there’s still quite a few beans around in the area or at least around my house left to come out of the fields. We have about 200 acres or so to run, which will take about two days.

Corn has been good to really good. The disease and stuff didn’t seem to hurt it much.

The lowest corn yield I’ve heard about is probably 180 and then I heard up to 250 to 260 bushels. If they had a water issue like drowning out, soybean yields of 48 bushels was the lowest I’ve heard on up to the 70s at the high end. That’s been about our range. There were water issues on both sides, too much or too little.

A lot of the corn moisture has depended on the maturity and when it was planted.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

Most guys have gotten started by now or are just getting started. The moisture of the corn varies by the maturity or when you planted, like it always does. I’ve been hearing all sorts of different moisture levels coming out of the fields. It’s the same thing with the beans.  

It’s been dry. Even though we’ve been getting intermittent showers, they haven’t amounted to a whole lot. I think we’ve had three in the last week. The rain has been just enough to slow down harvest. When the corn fodder is wet it makes it harder to get that the corn through the combine.

The wheat fields planted in September look really nice. I have not heard of anybody really cutting back on wheat yet around here.

Corn yields around here have been from 220 bushels down to 190 bushels. The one field run on our farm is running around 190, which would be right at its APH.… Continue reading

Kyle Nietfeld

We’ve seen a little bit of corn shelled and some guys are starting to cut some of the April beans. We haven’t personally done anything yet. I think we’re looking at the end of the week. There’s a chance for rain Wednesday, so that might change things. We do need the rain, so we won’t complain about it. If it doesn’t rain, I’d say by the end of the week we will be cutting some soybeans. We’ve got some green stem beans that are dry in spots and then green other areas. A rain might average the moisture out across the field. 

We just had some patches of white mold here and there in few fields. It dried off so it hasn’t really spread much. We haven’t had a significant rain here in a couple weeks. 

There’s been a little tar spot showing up here in the county and then some leaf blights, but nothing major.… Continue reading

Jeff Magyar

We’re too dry again. Some of the beans in the area are losing all their leaves. I don’t think there’ll be any September run beans, but some guys that planted 2.2s and 2.1s have plants that are losing leaves. They aren’t 50- to 60- bushel beans looking at them as the leaves come off. We had miserable heat and the plants just gave up. Plants that were showing no signs of changing just started yellowing everywhere in the fields after last week’s heat. The beans that were stressed from too much moisture earlier never bounced back. They’ve giving up. They’ve had enough.

White mold is terrible in some areas. I would say 25% to 30% of the soybean acres around here show a sign of white mold just driving by at 50 miles an hour. In other years, I have seen 70-bushel beans in one field and then you get a section that has bad white mold and yields go to 25.… Continue reading

Kyle Nietfeld

We have been receiving some decent rains here the last two weeks which is really helping the crops mature. We get an inch or an inch and a half here, an inch there. It’s probably, on average, been about an inch a week. It’s been really nice.

The beans are coming along. I think they’re pretty well done flowering and setting pods now and finishing filling the pods. We started getting those sunny days without that smoke and they really seemed to bush out and take off that’s for sure.  

The corn is really coming along. There’s not much tip back and it looks like everything pollinated really nicely. All the ears are filled out and looking really good. It sounds like silage chopping is probably coming up here about the first week of September.

I think they’re calling for temperatures around 95 or 96 here Thursday, but we’ll have enough moisture.… Continue reading

Doug Miller

Since the dry spring, we’ve had plenty of rain, but it’s been it’s been over a week since it rained and we’re ready for another shot. We missed the round this morning. We got a sprinkle out of it but it all went north of us. More rain is in the forecast for today, so hopefully we’ll grab one. If we can snag a couple of rains here in August, we’ll be in really good shape. Things are looking good. 

We’ve been spot spraying beans for weeds because of all the moisture coming and we wrapped up fungicide application on the beans. We also threw some insecticide in because we had some Japanese beetle issues. We just got that wrapped up and we’re trucking out wheat from harvest, we’re doing grain bin maintenance and when it gets real hot late in the afternoon, we call it a day.

From what I’ve seen, pollination was very good.… Continue reading

Doug Miller

Right now, things are looking really good after our dry spell this spring. We’ve been getting plenty of rain, probably a little too much, which has been making it very tough for the boys to finish baling straw. They’re running behind stripper heads and they said the straw quality has been very good. We got wheat harvest wrapped up and the yields were great. I heard of wheat yields anywhere from 90 to 122 bushels around here. 

We got all the double-crop beans planted, but it was about a week later than normal. I’m spraying double-crop beans this morning because we got a lot of weed pressure since the rain. We’ve been spot spraying beans for the last week or so. We will start the fungicide on the beans tomorrow and they should be finishing up fungicide on the corn.

No-till beans are shorter than where we did some form of tillage.… Continue reading

By Jeff Magyar

We’ve gotten maybe two inches of rain total in the last couple of weeks and we’re hanging in there. We tried to do some anhydrous on some late corn for a neighbor in Orwell, which is 10 miles from the farm, but it was so wet we couldn’t run. South of us in Trumbull County they have gotten an inch at best so they’re really hurting. The rain has been spotty, very erratic over the last two weeks.

Corn seems to be handling the conditions better. Beans just aren’t taking off in this area and you don’t see the darkening color. The nodules have been very slow getting started. I also always remember the old adage in which the dry years scare you to death and wet years starve you to death.

The early stuff that we planted the beginning of May may be tasseling in the next day or two, but the later corn that had trouble emerging and was waiting on water is a foot tall at best.… Continue reading

Doug Miller

We’ve been very blessed. Since our long three-week dry period, we’ve had pretty good showers come through and more chances of rain in the forecast. Things look 100% better than they did before we started getting rain.

When it was dry, the crops kind of just sat there dormant and didn’t move much but they responded very well to the rain. I think we could respond even better if we had a little more heat coming right now, but the cool and the damp is better than heat and no rain and things are looking pretty good up to this point. Without more heat, we may have wetter corn come harvest. I’m sure that’ll turn around — it usually does.

It was good to get the moisture to get the weeds up and get the herbicides going, but now it’s time to get the spray on as weeds emerge.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

We finally got a rain last night. We got 3.5 tenths. That was the first rain we’ve had in around 35 days. I think it is a local record for dry spell or having the driest May on record. It was starting to hurt crops. It was a very much appreciated rain. We’ve got another chance on Tuesday to get some more rain, maybe a 70% chance. Hopefully we can get more rain this week.

The crops are still about a week behind. I like to see corn knee high by the 15th of June and it’s not. I think we’re only going to have one field around that tall. This rain will really help it, but we’re going to have a cool day today too.

The early planted corn, some of that got crusted in and it’s not quite as good of a stand. The later planted corn is all there and it’s a really good stand.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

Corn and soybean planting got finished up on May 19 early in the morning and the spraying is caught up. Then that night we got four tenths of an inch of rain, so that was just about ideal. Stuff sprouted really quickly because it’s been warm enough. 

It seems like in this area there’s almost more corn to go yet. There was quite a bit of corn planted around here the middle of the week. Guys in this area have been planting beans ahead of corn but there’s not a lot of acres left to go up here yet. The planting conditions were really nice last week.

Planting took around six to seven days total for both corn and soybeans. If the weather cooperates, with the machinery we have nowadays, we are able to do that. The equipment we have compared to what we used to have is amazing.… Continue reading

(Update as of May 5)

Kyle Nietfeld

We’ve seen snow and rain here the last couple days. The snow was not accumulating, but there were some flakes flying around. In the last week, we’ve had almost two inches of rain. There were a few small, short downpours but mostly it was just wet, misty and drizzly. Currently, it’s nice out and it’s starting to dry off on the top. Ideally, we could get back in on Monday, but I think there’s an 80% chance of rain in the forecast this Saturday to Sunday. If we get missed, I would say on some of the drier ground we could be going on Monday.

I heard soil temperatures were as low as 38 or 39 degrees last weekend. I’m guessing after the nice sunny day yesterday and again this morning, I would say by this afternoon they’ll be in the 50s again. This area is maybe only 10% to 15% planted.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

With the nice weather, it worked out really well. We were able to get all the fertilizer spread and get the tiling finished up. We had a cold snap there just after the nice weather then we got some rain. When it dries off again, things will be ready to go. There were a few guys in the area that got some crops planted. I’ve got a friend in the area that got 220 acres of corn planted and a bunch of other guys started to plant beans. That gave them an opportunity to get the bugs out and get things working so they’ll be ready to go when the weather’s ready to go. There was also tillage and that type of stuff going on. With that nice weather, it’s hard for a farmer just to stay inside.

When it dries out next time, we’ll be getting closer to the end of April.… Continue reading

Lawrence Onweller

I started farming with my father-in-law and my brother in 1980. Then my father-in-law retired and my brother-in-law went to work at Mazda, so I pretty much took over the farm in the mid 80s. At that time it was a little tough.

Now we raise corn and soybeans. I’m pretty much semi-retired and I have a young man that has worked for me take over. He is doing the farming and making the decisions. It is kind of nice.

We have some really good dirt, but we also have yellow sand. It’s droughty and we usually have dry weather in the summer so that really dings us on yield. We have some heavier ground that’s challenging too, but compared to a lot of guys, our heavy ground is their good ground, so we’re blessed with that.

Being near Lake Erie has been challenging, but it’s also been good because it makes us better farmers and better stewards of the land when you have people watching like that.… Continue reading