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Arkansas rice harvest winding down

Rice harvest is winding down across most of Arkansas with yields that the president of the Arkansas Rice Foundation says are about average.

Dan Hosman farms south of Jonesboro.  “All of the timely planted fields have been harvested,” he says.  “There have been decent yields, not anything great.  And the later planted fields across the state are running an average of about 10 percent below average yields.”

He tells Brownfield they should be able to wrap up the 2019 harvest very soon.

While the October rains haven’t really slowed harvest – he says it has caused some problems when it comes to field conditions.  “It’s just rutting the ground up,” he says.  “That will be the challenge on the later harvested stuff is going back behind the harvesting crews and fixing the ruts that are in the fields.”

Hosman says the wet spring and the amount of prevented plant caused rice acres to decline this year, but looking ahead to 2020 – he’s expecting to see an increase in acres (planted to rice).