RICHMOND — The fall harvest for corn is nearly complete in southern Franklin County. And it’s been an ugly one so far, said Ralph Ferguson, Beachner Grain, Richmond. Outside of a few fields along stream bottoms, corn brought into the elevator has been mediocre, if not poor, he said. Test weights for harvested corn have been in the low 50s, and his year’s yields – 40 to 45 bushels per acre — have been running about one-third to one-half of the normal average of 100 to 110 bushels per acre, he said. The harvested corn shows all the signs of heat stress, including some instances of aflatoxin, he said. U.S. Department of Agriculture forecasts of the U.S. corn crop in the Corn Belt have been regularly downgraded in recent weeks, because of heat and drought at critical times in the plants’ development, especially in Kansas and Missouri. Corn and soybeans are Franklin County’s two most important fall grain crops. Ferguson said he’s not expecting the soybean harvest to be any better than the corn crop.
Wednesday, Sept. 14, 11 a.m.
