Plenty of inconsistent corn

GRIDLEY – This week’s Pro Farmer Midwest Crop Tour says it all about the Illinois corn crop: there is inconsistent corn out there.

“You can break down about three different buckets and each one looks a little different and there’s different potential for them each as well,” said Kyle Wettstein, a field advisor with Brandt Consolidated.

Wettstein believes the April planted corn looks decent. Much of this corn is holding up well as it is in the dent stage moving closer to maturity. May planted corn is uneven and firing. Disease development is prevalent as well as tip-back.

“I’m a little nervous on May planted corn,” Wettstein admits. “I think the yields are going to be pretty inconsistent just because of some of the holes in those fields.”

Corn which was planted in June appears to be healthy with little disease pressure so far. We just need a late frost at this point. Wettstein encourages growers to keep a close eye on stalk quality as harvest approaches – especially the May corn where the plant has been cannibalized already.

On the soybean side of things, Wettstein has not observed much disease pressure as insects are the main issue currently. Pod counts and nodes are less than last year so this will likely be an average to slightly below average soybean year.

“There’s something to be said for putting fungicide on beans and hopefully pushing some weight onto the seed because there’s not going to be a ton of pods like we had in the past.”