Showing posts with label corn yields. Show all posts
Showing posts with label corn yields. Show all posts

Monday, September 21, 2015

Corn Harvest: In the Bin


Another harvest is in the books. It seems kind of anticlimactic. We started corn harvest on August 27 and finished on Tuesday, September 15, with lots of starts and stops along the way. We only had 243 acres of corn, so it is not a primary crop here on the County Line.

The last load, September 15, 2015
This was our third corn crop. It was not a banner year for corn for us. Our highest yield was 73.7 bushels to the acre, but that was only a 17-acre field. The next best was 55.8 bushels per acre on a 50-acre field. The worst yield was 23.5 bu/acre on a 29-acre field. Overall yield average for 2015 was 43.88 bushels per acre.
All our corn is dryland. We had hot weather and no rain during the critical stages of corn development. We also had trouble controlling herbicide-resistant weeds.

So, how does corn harvest 2015 compare to our first two years? Our first year of corn production was 2013. We had an average yield of 57 bushels per acre, with a low of 18 and a high of 78. Last year, in 2014, we had a great year. Our average was 108 bushels per acre, with a low of 82 and a high of 145.

Here's a photographic look back at Corn 2015, with links to the blog posts telling about each stage of the crop's journey:
PLANTING
Randy initially started planting April 11, but we got rain that night and the next day, totaling 1.50 inches. Then, we got another 3.10 inches on April 16 and 17. A week later, April 23, a couple of fields had dried out enough to plant more. But when Randy about got the tractor and planter stuck after moving to another field, he took another hiatus. He started again April 28.
 
 Just getting started

GROWTH
June 1, 2015
 







HARVEST

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Corn Kernels

The combine has gulped its last "bite" of our dryland corn crop, and we're moving on to the next crop -  planting wheat for harvest in the summer of 2014. 
Photo through the dirty combine window, but you can see the corn cobs coming into the combine.
This was our first time ever to raise dryland corn. We planted it as our row crop instead of milo this year. Randy picked the right year to try it. After the past two summers of extreme drought, we received some timely rains this summer.
Wheat is our primary crop, and that won't change anytime soon. But Randy was pleased with the overall average yield of 57 bushels per acre for our debut as corn farmers.
View from the combine cab during harvest
We had a low yield of 18 bushels per acre. That ground isn't as fertile with any crop, and pollination of the corn crop occurred during the hottest and driest days of the summer, further dropping yields. Our highest yield was a field that brought in 78 bushels per acre.
Harvest time is like seeing miracles happen. It's pretty amazing to think that this small plant I photographed in May ...

May 2013
... then throughout the summer ...
August 2013
... yielded its grain in September.
On the left is the corn cob after the grain has been removed by the combine.

 Randy has already placed his order for next year's corn seed. And the adventure continues ...