Thank you to all who were able to attend our appreciation dinner in August. We enjoy the opportunity to work with so many good people and enjoy the many relationships that have been built. We were blessed with great weather for the evening and most of our landowner partners and suppliers were able to attend. Everyone always seems to look forward to getting together before harvest and the appreciation dinner has proven to be an excellent way of doing just that.
The crop is coming along and harvest is only two or three short weeks away. The heat and dry conditions we experienced in August sped the crop along. Some much needed rain and cooler temperatures recently have slowed the crop’s progress to a much more normal rate.
As we discussed at the appreciation dinner, we expect the corn yields to be highly variable this year. Planting date, location, and maturity will all have large impacts on final yields. We expect some farms to match the record yields seen the past two years and some farms are already being estimated to be 50 or more bushels off pace. The recent rain may add some yield to the later planted and later maturing corn hybrids.
Soybeans, on the other hand, show much greater potential. The last rains we received caught the soybeans at their R5 growth stage, which is the seed fill stage. A combination of timely moisture, less stressful temperatures, and sunshine is just what the doctor ordered to maximize bean yields this late in the season.
Planning for next year’s crop is off to a slow start. If market conditions remain unchanged we intend to continue with higher acreages of soybeans as we did this year. We have purchased some seed already for next year and today we priced and booked an estimated amount of fertilizer. In the next month we will need to make firm decisions on crop rotations and fall fertility applications. It is unusual for us to be making these decisions this late in the year, but current market conditions are unclear.