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Tough spring leads to difficult harvest for Minnesota farmer

A south-central Minnesota farmer describes the first third of his corn harvest as challenging.

Lawrence Sukalski of Fairmont tells Brownfield you have to have patience during a year like this.

“The conditions are tough. We had a tough, late planting season that sets us up for a set of challenges for a late, wet harvest. The wet grain is difficult on rotors and belts.”

Back in the combine Friday morning, he says his corn crop is extremely variable.

“We’ve got some really good test weights, but then we’ve had some 51 and 52 pound stuff. It just depends on when it got planted. The last corn planted was June 7th. The earliest corn we planted was May 4th, so quite a difference there.”

Sukalski says a hard freeze last week has helped his corn dry down about six points.

All his intended soybean acres went to prevent plant this year following persistent rains that went into June.