As corn and soybeans make their final run through the development stage, one local expert sees Greene County in a really good position.

Landus Cooperative Field Agronomist Dan Bjorklund says the lack of rainfall in the last month has not negatively impacted crops in Greene County because the majority of the fields that were planted on time have matured and are turning yellow, signaling the completion of the crops growing period. He shares his thoughts on whether there is a benefit for rainfall at this point moving forward to harvest season.

“Any rain now probably is not going to do much to benefit the corn and soybeans unless they were planted late May or in the first part of June. And we had some of that in Greene County but not a lot.”   

Bjorklund points out different reasons why this year he believes some Greene County farmers could see their best corn yields yet.

“I’ve been walking corn fields for 44 years and field after field, after field that I’ve looked at (and) plots that I’ve looked at, we have really, really nice sized ears out there. They’re filled to the tip, the kernel depths are great, and I think the mild weather really helped us get great pollination, set the stage for just fantastic yields. And then the guys that took care of the problems like the leaf diseases with fungicide, they’re going to be really happy.”       

Bjorklund urges farmers who are seeing their crops turn to lots of yellow to start planning to harvest soon, so they don’t run into possible issues with standability of corn and capitalize on high yield potential.