Activity to pick up this week

A combine makes its way through a Central Illinois field on Sunday.

GIBSON CITY – Harvest is slow to start around Central Illinois, but local farmer Greg Kerber expects activity to pick up around Gibson City this week.

“Stuff has dried down tremendously fast here in the last two weeks,” Kerber told The Central Illinois Farm Network.

Fields look good to Kerber, despite the August flooding in Ford County which did minimal damage to crops.

“The bigger thing will be the wind we had on Tuesday,” noted Kerber.

While entire fields are standing, there are patches where corn was blown over. Kerber considers this “manageable” as he has been through worse conditions. He feels there will be surprises out in the field this fall based on seed variety and planting date.

“It’ll slow us up a little bit but not too bad.”

The August flooding was hard on Gibson City but really was a beneficial rain event for crops at the time. Kerber observed five inches of rain fall northwest of town during the flood which he does not consider detrimental.

Kerber remains optimistic about crop yields this fall despite a season which saw various weather extremes – from dryness to wet conditions. He thinks corn will turn out better than beans, saying beans don’t appear to be a record-breaking crop this year.

The warm weather of late is pretty cheap drying for farmers.

“Things are maturing like they should,” Kerber said.

Brown husks on healthy green stalks is a good sign, according to Kerber. Also, everyone is still mowing the yard which is another positive for this late in the year when we often see dry weather.