Update 1:05 pm June 27th: The Salina Post has contacted local elevators and has been informed that harvest is in full swing, approximately 30% to 40% of harvest is complete. Moisture content is down below 11% and test weights are coming in at 61 pounds per bushel. If you look in the sky around salina you can already see by the smoke that some fields are being burnt off. The weather looks like it will continue to cooperate for the rest of the harvest as well.
Update 1:49 p.m. The Salina Post has been in contact with multiple grain elevators and is receiving reports that the test weight coming in is 60.5 pounds per bushel with a moisture content of 12%. Harvest was slow over the weekend but the hot dry weather has put it into full swing. They are harvesting fields on every side of Salina and you can watch them harvest up and down old 81 highway.
The Salina Post has contacted multiple grain elevators and has received reports of little to no grain received. Elevators are expecting harvest to pick up if there is no precipitation. The forecast is hot and sunny for the rest of the week, conditions should be optimum for harvest.
Harvest reports for the Hays region.
Midland Marketing told Hays Post late Sunday evening they had seen test weights from 57-60 at their Ellis County elevators. Moisture content was down to 10. They had not done any protein tests. Staff at their Yocemento Elevator said they took in approximately 30,000 bushels of wheat on Sunday.
At Golden Belt in Ellis, Merle told Hays Post, “Harvest is picking up and it’s getting busy. We have taken in 30,000 bushels with test weights in the high 50s-60 and moisture content from 11-12.
In Trego County, Caleb with Cargill told Hays Post, “Our Ogallah and WaKeeney elevators are both open and going but we are far from busy yet. We have taken in approximately 16-20,000 bushels. The test weights were 57 to 63 and moisture in the 11s.”
While the 2013 Kansas wheat harvest took a long time to get started, it didn’t take long for it to reach northern Kansas, with activity reported as far north as Hays in northwest Kansas, Beloit in north central Kansas; a thunderstorm Sunday morning in east central Kansas kept many farmers in that region out of the harvest field Sunday.
Kansas wheat commissioner Rich Randall found a field of summer-fallow wheat dry enough to harvest near Scott City on Saturday. Grain averaged 11% moisture; test weight is 58 pounds per bushel. The field averaged about 25 bushels per acre. Continuous wheat fields are expected to yield much less, Randall says. By Tuesday, he expects the area harvest to be in full swing.
Three days into the harvest in the Bazine area, harvest is about 20% complete according to Brandy Feltman at the Coop Grain and Supply there. With test weights averaging about 59 pounds per bushel and protein averaging about 13, farmers report the crop is performing a bit better than expected, although they don’t have any yield data yet.
In Pawnee and Stafford counties, harvest is about 25% complete according to Kim Barnes at the Pawnee County Co-op. Test weight and moisture at the cooperative’s four locations in Larned, Garfield, Dartmouth and Macksville averages about 60 pounds per bushels and 12% moisture. No protein levels or yield estimates are available. Frost and drought hurt the crop, and some farmers are disappointed in yield; others are pleasantly surprised at the crop’s ability to withstand the stress.
Harvest has reached the Beloit area in north central Kansas, reports Alan Tillberg, manager of the Farmway Co-op elevator there. Farmers began cutting wheat south of town on Friday; early results are 11.5 moisture, 61 pound test weight average and yields ranging from 40 to 56 bushels per acre. Tillberg expects the harvest average to be about 40 bushels per acre; some farmers report light freeze damage in isolated wheat fields in the area and hailstorms damaged the crop west and northeast of Beloit.
Jim Michael, KAWG director from McCune, says wheat harvest has progressed to northern Crawford County on Sunday. Yields for both soft and hard winter wheat range from 50 to 70 bushels per acre, and test weights are right at the 60 pound per bushel benchmark. The crop quality is not expected to be as high this year as in past years due to more late-season rains than normal, and the crop is slow to dry down. The area has more wheat this year than in the past several years. The 2013 Harvest Report is brought to you by the Kansas Wheat Commission, Kansas Association of Wheat Growers and sponsors Kansas City Board of Trade, and the Kansas Grain & Feed Association.
Updates for harvest reports will be posted for other parts of Kansas as they are collected.