The corn and soybean harvest is moving along, but the progress varies widely because of the wet spring that delayed planting. Much of the harvest has been completed in southeast Iowa, but in western Humbodlt County in northcentral Iowa, Robert Lynch is just getting into the field to harvest corn.  “We’ve taken out about 20 acres or 25 acres of corn, and it’s running anywhere between 19 and 25-percent for moisture. This corn was planted in April — had the snow on it, ” Lynch says.

He says the wet-cold  weather delayed the development of the corn. “It’s 101-day corn. It’s running between a hundred-and-seventy-five- and-220 (days to maturity). It’s averaging right close to 200-bushels-per-acre,” according to Lynch. He farms 1,700 acres near Gilmore City and hasn’t even started to harvest his soybeans yet.

Lynch says he has some neighbors who have started in on the beans. “Some that were planted in May. Ours were all planted toward the middle of June, so ours are just coming on now,” Lynch says. He says he’s heard of yields as  high as 65 bushels an acre, and some low as 16.

Lynch says the difference in yields is directly related to the amount of moisture each field saw. “Depends on when you got rain and where they were,” he says.

The U.S.D.A. weekly crop report was not released this week due to the government shut down. Iowa Agriculture Secretary, Bill Northey issued a statement on harvest: “In general, what I’m hearing from around the state is that many farmers were able to start harvesting before the wet weather moved in late last week.  If we get several days of dry, warm weather this week as forecasted, that will help crops dry down and farmers will again be busy harvesting both corn and soybeans,” Northey said.