US Wheat Tour: Growers jumpy about weather before harvest

 

 

An annual US spring wheat tour found more fields with strong yield potential Wednesday, but producers are nervous about the possibility that weather could hurt the immature crop before harvest.

 

Crop scouts on the Wheat Quality Council's Hard Spring Wheat and Durum Tour surveyed fields across North Dakota for the second day, with some scouts also venturing into eastern Montana. They fanned out from Mandan, North Dakota (ND), on Wednesday morning and met up in Devils Lake, ND, to compare notes on what they'd seen.

 

Based on surveys of 149 fields, the average calculated yield for hard red spring wheat was 44.6 bushels per acre, up from 34.4 bushels last year. Scouts checked 28 durum fields and calculated an average yield of 35.4 bushels, up from 23.3 bushels last year. HRS wheat is used to make bread, and durum is used to make pasta.

 

The crops have benefited from good subsoil moisture following a wet spring and from cool weather this summer, scouts said. On the first day of the tour, the average yield calculated for HRS wheat was 45.7 bushels per acre, up from the 37.6 bushels on the first day last year.

 

"Our numbers speak for themselves," a veteran tour participant said. "If it continues to have good, favourable weather and gets harvested in a timely manner, this could be a big, big crop."

 

Harvest will be later than normal this year because development is behind schedule following late planting in the spring. It will be a month before cutting starts in many areas of North Dakota, scouts said.

 

Producers said they were worried about the potential for wet or cold weather to damage the crop before they can get it out of the fields. Wet weather can delay harvest, leaving the crop to deteriorate in the fields, while a freeze can hurt vulnerable plants.

 

"It looks good, but it's a month late," said Charlie Rohde, a producer from Langdon, ND, in the northeast corner of the state. "Our big fear is an early frost."

 

Short days in August and September can make "for kind of a scramble at the end" for producers harvesting spring wheat, said Neal Fisher, administrator for the North Dakota Wheat Commission. They have a shorter window to harvest during the day because they have to wait for dew to dry on the plants before cutting, he said.

 

"There's great potential here," Fisher said. "We'll see how it shakes out."

 

There are worries about dryness in some areas that have not seen much rain in the past month. A producer with land in Eddy, Foster and Stutsman counties - in east-central North Dakota - said it has been "extremely dry" since the beginning of June. It will be another four weeks before spring wheat is ready to be cut, he said.

 

"Mother Nature has too much time," he said.

 

Overall, wheat does not face heavy disease pressure, tour participants said. There have been reports of insects, including aphids and grasshoppers, but they are generally not serious threats, they said.

 

One field near Harvey, ND, in central North Dakota, had a large number of aphids, scouts said. The field had a high calculated yield of 74.2 bushels but probably won't produce that much because of the infestation, they said.

 

"There were some insects," a scout said. "Most of the fields could use a drink of water. But all in all, it looks like a decent crop."

 

The tour, which began Tuesday in Fargo, ND, will leave Devils Lake on Thursday and survey fields for a third and final day. Scouts will meet up back in Fargo for their last meeting, at which final yield estimates will be issued about 3:45 p.m. EDT. Final production estimate will not be issued.