Northeast Iowa Crop Conditions

September was a good month for the crops, with mostly above normal temperatures and adequate rain to finish the 2019 crops off. However, the rains lately have been too much of a good thing, and we are in need of some drier weather to allow harvest to start. A few early soybeans have been harvested or are ready. Corn has reached maturity or will be soon, but has a long way to go drying down in the field before harvest will make sense. Currently, it looks like at least a
week before any field work can be done given recent rains and a wet forecast.

Grains took a nice jump this week. A bullish stocks report surprised the market with less corn and soybeans on hand at the end of the 2018/2019 marketing year. Either feed use was above expectations, or last year’s crop was smaller than estimated. In either case, carryover stocks as we enter this crop year are less burdensome, but still quite large. Now we wait for the combines to tell us what size crop we are working with this year. The favorable end to the growing season we’ve seen in most
areas should keep yields fairly close to current estimates of around 167-169 bu/acre on corn and 46-48 bu/acre on soybeans.
It will be a late harvest, as the most recent progress report issued on Monday show both corn and soybean progress both 20%+ behind normal levels.