(AgriNews) – Nearly ideal conditions have greeted wheat producers in southern Illinois, as planting wraps up in most areas.
The late start to the corn and soybean season, along with a delayed wheat harvest, pushed the crop back, but it is getting a good start in many areas. Kyle Brase of Edwardsville is pleased with planting, though he got his wheat in later than last season.
“Wheat planting is just finishing up in my area,” he said. “Conditions have been just perfect for planting. We’ve been relatively dry, so any field that we wanted to get in, we were able to get in.”
The National Agricultural Statistics Service reported that 89 percent of the Illinois wheat crop was planted as of Sunday, Oct. 27, with 47 percent emerged. That compares favorably to the five-year average.
“I feel really good about the crop,” Brase said.
A wet spring this year pushed back soybean planting in Illinois, and the subsequent late harvest resulted in later wheat planting in some places. Corn harvest was 74 percent complete across the state, while 85 percent of soybeans had been combined, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture reporting service.
Pioneer agronomist Josh Harris said Monday that planting was about 90 percent done in his service area, which is comprised of Clay, Marion and Wayne counties.
“When we started we were on the dry side, but the wheat did come up,” he said. “We had a good stand of wheat. The conditions have gotten better. There is perfect moisture for planting right now. The rains this week will probably wrap up wheat planting.”
Producers can expect sufficient growth in fields planted as late as Nov. 15, Harris added.
Planted acreage is likely to be down this year compared to last fall, largely because of the drought-induced failure of some corn and soybean crops in 2012.
Illinois producers planted 875,000 acres of what in 2012, according to NASS. That was a significant increase over the two previous years: 830,000 acres in 2011 and 660,000 in 2010.
“Acreage is down,” Harris said of his three-county region. “It’s not as big as last year, with all the destroyed acres last year. It’s probably off pace 10 to 15 percent.”
Wheat grower Gerald Forbeck of Carlyle expects to be finished with planting sometime during the first week of November.
“We’re a week or so behind,” he said. “Conditions are good.”
Brase was pleased with the wheat harvested in the summer, though it was later than average.
“Wheat yields and quality were good,” he said. “We’re really pleased with what we pulled out of the field in July. The crop was about weeks behind scheduled, but I was really pleased by the time we got through it.
“It was an extremely wet June. In fact, we had a pretty wet July and cooler weather than normal, which made double-crop beans a real challenge.”
Harris also saw a good harvest.
“Going into wheat harvest we had outstanding wheat,” he said. “Yields were phenomenal in my territory. There was quite a bit of germ damage in later harvested wheat. But all in all, we were able to carry pretty good test weights throughout.”
Forbeck, however, didn’t have the same fortune.
“Mine was disappointing because I had some water issues,” he said. “Test weight was down a little and yield was down a little, mainly because I lost some stand.”
