Just a little nubbin

Sprout just emerging from the seed, still has about 2 inches to get to daylight. Taproot is a little over an inch. Muggy as heck here today, but with all the humidity doesn't seem to be drying much. There goes my plans to get some planting done again today.


Might as well look for some more morels.
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Planting progress

So, when I got rained out and made it to the end of the field that acre counter stopped at 666.73, out of the 890 acres of corn I have to plant, and the 1040 total acres I have to plant. Been a long week (calculated that I worked just shy of 120 hours last week) but I got a lot done so I'm happy. Still tired this morning.

Most in my area are on their last day of corn if not wrapping it up. We got between .75 and 1 inch yesterday (in about a half hour). It POURED!! Even had a little small hail. We were getting nice and dry, so a lot should soak in, and today should be a good drying day. So I was hoping to get back planting today. I got 140 acre tilled and would take me about 9 hours to plant ( I got a little screwing around to do to get refilled for the next field). More than likely it will not get fit to till my next 80 until after this next front moves through.
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Yummy morels

Got rained out and had time to find some morels.

Getting going

Water pump went ouy on my tillage tractor, so I took the time to get my planter going and get the bugs worked out.

As of this typing I got 250 acres tilled (it was a long night) and 85 acres planted. I HOPE to get all 250 acres planted before the rain tonight.
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Creating SOME dust

Finally got my soil finisher back into the field today. Its not ideal, but it is working. Others in my area doing the same (all agree we are pushing it a little, but hard not to with the rain in the forecast.).
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Picking rock

None too dry (had to back out a couple spots today), but my hope is pick rock today and tomorrow morning, then till ground tomorrow afternoon, and try and plant 80-120 acres Wednesday before the rain. We will see if everything goes according to plan.

Frosty morning

As usual, its a bit chilly this morning, a few snow flake fell yesterday again and the 4" soil temps are back down to 45 f.

I was able to fix some tile yesterday, but that was a very ugly process in the feet of mud that I call my field.

Have a good weekend.

One creek goes down, the other goes up

It is normal for this creek to get out of its banks, and will have to rise another 3 feet before it backs up into any of my fields.

4" soil temps holding steady in the 47-48 range, 30% chance of snow (getting really old) here tomorrow, and I am still trying to decide where I want to go fishing....after reading fishing reports, even the fish aren't very active with this colder weather.

Rain !?!?!

Received a little under 2 inches last night. Rained for 9 hours straight. Have still not started planting and will be delayed at least another week now. Soil is still cold and saturated to the point you can squeeze liquid out of a handful....not good.

This is a picture of the creek behind my house. It is fed 100% from tile and surface water, so when it swells like this....it means the soil profile is full.

On the plus side......night crawlers were active this morning, and I was able to grab over 50 and store them for fishing.....I wonder when I will find time to do that? hmmmmm oh ya now!



I recorded a video yesterday, but don't really want to upload it based on its depressing how nice it was yesterday compared to today.

2.75 Inches accumulated

Topped out there and then switched to rain before I could get a pic started melting pretty fast.

Thunder Snow!!!

It didn't look too bad this morning, I even hauled a load of corn to the local ethanol plant, but when I got home......all hell broke loose.

Here are a couple pics,





And a video of the actual thunder snow will be uploaded to Ag Reports Network later today. Kyle Wendland (NE Iowa)

The start of another crop year......wont start anytime soon.

This time last year I was 1/4 done with corn, though that was very unusual, I think the fact that this year we are over a week away from planting is beginning to get worrisome. I have never had fond memories of planting corn in May. (2008 was my worst corn yield ever)

Saturday morning I woke up this wonderful (not) sight. Around and inch of snow was accumulated, and though it melted quickly, it did not do the soil temps any favors.


For 4" soil temps in Iowa I use this website.....



or http://extension.agron.iastate.edu/NPKnowledge/soiltemphistory.html if the link doesn't work
Soil temps need to be above 50 degrees and have a good forecast before planting corn. I still have bad memories of the May 10th frost last year.....and do not want to relive that.

This week I will be hauling corn and maybe picking some rock if it dries out again....but that looks doubtful.

Windy day

This old wet holding bin hadn't been moved for 3 years and never bothered with all the storms and wind, until yesterday.

Harvest time

Everything is ready to roll. Hope to do 40-50 acres today to get a good feel for moisture and yield in a few different fields. Top image is my dryer setup, bottom is my fields north of my house (DK 49-35RR).

Fields of Gold...again

This picture is from the field south of my house. It is Agrigold 6309 SmartStax. The plant health looks great with just a few blemishes on the leaves. Four ears averaged 19.5 kernals around, 32.5 kernals long, and roughly 31,000 plants per acre. Doing the calculations would put me close to 210 bu/acre. I would be very happy with a yield like that as that would be the best yield ever on this farm by about ten bushels.

Beautiful Beans

Stopped to check on my beans yesterday. I was very impressed how they have been handling the excess moisture and now the heat. The rows were not quite shaded, but that is normal with this variety (NK S21-N6). The plants were already setting quite a few pods...(6-12 each)...which also surprised me.

Fields of Gold

Here are a couple of pics from this am. One shows the field south of my house. Fully tasseled and pretty much completely pollinated. The other pic shows an ear from that field. Looking at the ear it looks like pollination went great, about 38 kernels long and 18 rows around....final stand in this field was around 31,750. It is important that the roots find plenty of nitrogen and water during the filling stage or else the plant will cannibalize the stalk and abort kernel, which can hurt yield severely.

I should also mention that in the field picture, the corn close to the house is a different hybrid than the corn further away.....that is the reason for the color change (tassels).

Nice videos on Ag Reports Network

There are a few nice videos on the website from the past week.

http://www.agreportsnetwork.com/cms/north-america

Click on each farmers tack to view individual videos, or click the yellow box on the left-hand side to open the "Latest Video Report"

I have a busy day of shingling planned, and will have a new video tomorrow.

Talk about a down pour!

This is my driveway, has approximately 160 acres drains under it....most the time. The two 24" culverts could not keep up this morning.

SmartStax may be the real deal

On the left is a root ball from Agrigold 6309 Smart Stack variety, on the right is a root ball from Dekalb 52-59 VT3. Although overall root mass seems similar, what was surprising for me is the finer root hairs. The finer root hairs to me means better root growth, which means better nutrient uptake, which means better yields come fall. I have high hopes for my Smart Stacks corn.