From the Data Bunker | Aug. 16, 2021 (Emily Carolan)
What a start to the 2021 Pro Farmer Crop Tour! We began the week with a record number of stops in both South Dakota and Ohio. Thank you scouts for making the most of our days in the fields!
My name is Emily Carolan and for the past 10 years, I’ve been the person behind the computer crunching the sample numbers for the Pro Farmer Crop Tour. I’m excited to be back out on the western leg of the tour getting in a few samples before the data starts to flow from both the east and the western legs for us to analyze. Over the course of this week, we’ll pull over 3,500 samples throughout 7 states in corn and bean fields. We have along nearly 100 scouts this year to make it all happen.
Alright- let’s jump into he numbers for a peak behind the scenes on what we’re looking at within the data.
Where we normally have somewhat similar reports from South Dakota and Ohio for potential, this year they are polar opposites. They talked about it a lot at the virtual event hosted online with a viewing party in Grand Island, NE and Dublin, OH. Tyne Morgan wrapped up the event by saying “the east is a beast and the west is parched”.
The data tells us a story about the crop sometimes, and we find trends in what we sample in a year and compare them to nearly 30 years of data taken the exact same way. There are a few key items I’m looking at this year as indicators from the data to tell me which way this crop might lean. First is ear counts. What I thought before we started the tour was with early planting and the weird spring that came after it, ear counts may be off enough to drag yield lower than expected. As we all know, more ears mean more kernels- it’s our biggest factor contributing to yield.
So, here’s what the data told us today- we’re down less than a percent in South Dakota for ear counts over last year and in Ohio we found an ear count up 5% from last year. South Dakota compared to the three year average is up nearly a percent, where Ohio is up 5.5% from the three year. So- indicator number one is somewhat debunked in the first two states of the tour.
The next indicator is kernel rows. It might not be the most ‘yield changing’ indicator but if we lose even one row around on average, that’s a lot of kernels we need to make up for in ear counts or grain inches to get yield to higher levels. South Dakota came in at an average of 15.75 kernel rows around and Ohio was 15.68. South Dakota is down 3.5% from last year and Ohio is nearly spot on from the 2020 tour results and the 3 year average. South Dakota being down is the largest red flag about that crop to me. You can’t go back to June when the kernel rows around were being determined in the plant to add more kernels to fill out in the coming month. June was a stressful month for this crop in South Dakota and it leads me to believe the kernels would have never been there even with a good pollination window.
Alright, let’s talk about grain length for my third and final indicator. South Dakota average grain length was 6.31 inches and down 14% from last year and 11.5% from the 3 year average. One notable response from the scouts was they didn’t notice the tip back like what was talked about before the tour started. What they did notice was just simply shorter ears than normal. Another strong indicator of a tough early vegetative growth period for this crop. Jumping into Ohio- average grain inches was 6.99, which is up 5% from last year and 6% up from the 3 year average. Exactly why the crop they found in Ohio is one of the best Ohio has ever had.
The bean indicators are a touch different because we have the scouts give a rating on maturity of the crop and moisture in the soil. Those two alone helps give us indicators if a crop is mature or still has potential to add a few pods if a nice rain comes our way. The crops we found in South Dakota indicated a less mature crop than what we toured last year but moisture is significantly harder to find. What this means is it may not have the opportunity to put on more pods to grow the crop before maturity sets in. In Ohio we found an average maturity crop along with higher than normal moisture levels. Keep on growing-Ohio crop! You’ve got a strong yield coming your way with a few more rains to finish this crop off.
Like always, this week is such a blast. From the scouting to the nightly events- it’s always great to see familiar faces in the crowds and we’re just so happy to be back with everyone this year in some type of a in person meeting.
Tomorrow we head from Grand Island to Nebraska City, NE on the western leg and from Noblesville, IN to Bloomington, Illinois on the eastern leg. Tomorrow night we’ll release the final numbers for Indiana and Nebraska. Stay tuned this week for constant content on Twitter, Pro Farmer, and AgWeb sites!
