Weekly Crop Progress Report

Reading the Weekly Crop Progress report last evening there was one figure that stood out. As of the middle of September 32 percent of the U.S. corn has not dented! The 5 year average would be 87 percent dented. Doing the math on the USDA acres planted 14.5 million acres of corn has not dented. Generally it takes 400 growing degree units for corn to move from the dent stage to maturity or black layer. This means it is impossible for a lot of corn to reach maturity even with a killing frost late in October.

In our area it appears that the corn that was planted by the middle of May has a very good chance of reaching maturity. After that window to plant in the middle of May it rained for two weeks. There is a lot of corn that was planted in early June. There is a reasonable chance that corn will get to one half milk line. The problem is even if we have a very late October frost the corn just shuts down.

On the positive sign if the corn can get to half milk line you will have around 90 percent of the potential yield. Remember though, you already had a big yield reduction for planting a month late. You can just not make up for missing 30 days of the growing season!