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Agronomist reports variability in corn and soybean conditions in northern Indiana

An agronomist is northern Indiana says the corn crop is looking great going into one of the most important parts of the season: the reproductive stage.

Jason Harmon is with DEKALB Asgrow.

“I saw a couple fields in my recent travels that were wanting to start sending some tassels, so we’re getting really close,” he says. “I know this has been a struggle for many of my growers in this territory of just how dry this year has been.”

He tells Brownfield he’s pleasantly surprised the crop is looking so good despite dry conditions in June.

“We were missing the rains and hoping for rains, getting a few (rain events) here with some getting more than others, but overall, we were just getting the bare minimum. I just saw a statistic recently from BAM Weather out of Indianapolis that posted how we ranked in my territory for rain in June. They included over 131 years of recorded data, and we are right there. It wasn’t a record, but it was close to being one of the driest Junes,” he says. “That’s been something that’s been tough to watch our crops try to manage through that. But, looking at the corn now, you wouldn’t know how dry it was and I think that’s a big contributor to how farmers are managing the crops, but also to the genetic potential we have in the seed today.”

Harmon says soybeans are showing signs of stress.

“Many farmers wish we were full out canopy right now. Once we hit the summer solstice, we really want to see a full out canopy because we are transitioned over into the reproductive stages already. Our beans just don’t have the height that we would expect at this time of year and it’s really due to the dryness,” he says. “I feel like the potential is still strong. It’s just right now the beans did not have a good vegetative growth stage where they were able to get some height and more nodes to them. We can still make up ground, but I feel like beans are kind of showing this struggle a little more than corn is to date.”

He says dryness is still a big concern moving forward.

Audio: Jason Harmon

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