Northeast Iowa Crop Conditions

The past week saw our warmest temperatures of the summer, with 5 days of highs in the 90’s, high humidity, and very warm nights. Fortunately, before this stretch, most of the area had a very good rain event and soil moisture was adequate in most places, and even excessive in some. Corn will be finishing pollination over the next week and the April planted corn is in the milk stage. Our warm weather has pushed development ahead of normal.Soybeans are flowering and setting pods. Most soybean fields are looking very good, and few insect or disease problems have showed up so far.

Markets have been all about the weather. The much anticipated heat wave did not last long enough to cause problems, and most of the corn belt has had very good weather in July. Markets have taken out virtually all weather premium built earlier in the growing season, and now it is a waiting game to see how yields turn out. A hot and dry August could still adversely affect soybean pod fill and corn ear fill, so stay tuned.