Producers Blog
Harvest 2013 – Eastern Nebraska
Mark Grundmayer (Soybean Product Manager/Sales Agronomist, Region 4 – Eastern Nebraska)
Harvest 2013: It’s acting a lot like Planting 2013 in eastern Nebraska with delays, rain and snow. The good news is that yields are much higher than expected. Soybean yields started the trend with some tremendous field averages, some topping 70 bu/ac. We can thank the August rains for those yield levels. Dryland corn yields have been pretty amazing as well. Field averages of well over 200 bu/ac have been reported in many areas. Irrigated corn has done equally as well. A NET plot in Platte County averaged nearly 288 bu/ac with five hybrids yielding over 300 bu/ac.
The northeast part of the state was short of heat units, and hybrids finished slow and held some moisture. The southeast area did not have a heat unit shortage and harvest moistures were generally below 18%. The Highway 91 area was the dividing line. Our new products, both corn and soybeans, performed very well across the region. The excellent performance level across our entire lineup allows for extremely solid hybrid/variety packages. I always like to see growers plant 3-4 corn hybrids on their farms. The multiple hybrid approach gives the grower genetic diversity, as well as spreads out flowering date, which can help minimize the impact of an extreme weather event during that crucial time. Soybeans should be planted in a similar manner, with 50-60% of the grower’s acres planted to the maturity group best suited for that particular area, and splitting the remaining acres between earlier and later maturing varieties. Again, this multiple product approach spreads risk across a wider range of dates and allows for harvesting of beans at more optimal moisture levels. There are many university trials showing the yield advantage of harvest moistures above 12% versus 8%.
Our website is a great place to visit, with plot data from our entire sales area being updated regularly during harvest. You can sort by crop, state, county, District Sales Manager, etc. Contact your local DSM for any additional information you may need, or while on our website, feel free to use the Contact Us tab.
