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Dry weather speeding along planting

The month-long planting season is wrapping up for a farmer in central Michigan.

Jeff Thorlund of Greenville tells Brownfield dry conditions helped the planting season go smoothly for potatoes, corn, and soybeans.

“We’ve had a dry month of May, but for planting it’s been great,” he shares.  “The soil conditions have been wonderful and soil moisture has been good. We could use some rain, but right now everything seems to be holding it’s own and looks good.”

Thorlund says he’s now focusing on dry beans.

“We like to get the dry beans up and get them emerged before we get too heavy thunderstorms or rain,” he says.  “That causes ground compaction and then the beans have a difficult time coming through the ground.”

He says good soil moisture is still available at least an inch and a half down into soils for planting but rain in the coming weeks would be helpful for development.