By LINDA McGURK
Indiana Correspondent

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — The dry and warm November weather has been a welcome break for farmers trying to get their crops harvested, but a month behind schedule, they’re still facing an uphill battle and are slowed by quality issues.

“One of the things we can say for sure is that it’s going to be a continued delayed harvest,” said Chris Hurt, Purdue University agricultural economist, during a Nov. 9 conference call. “We’re probably not even going to get to 15 percent of the corn harvested per week and we have 60 to 65 percent to go, at best. It’s going to be four weeks before we get the crop out, maybe five weeks. It’s going to be a long, long process.”

As of Nov. 8 only 31 percent of the corn in Illinois and 41 percent of the crop in Indiana had been picked, compared with 78 and 87 percent, respectively, at the same time last year. The five-year average is 92 percent for Illinois and 86 percent for Indiana, according to USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).
Michigan, Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and North and South Dakota were also far behind schedule, compared with last year’s harvest and the five-year average.

The Nov. 8 NASS report showed Indiana farmers have harvested 81 percent of their soybeans, compared with 96 percent at this time last year and a five-year average of 94 percent. In Illinois, 69 percent of the beans were done, compared with 94 percent last year and a five-year average of 96 percent.

The late harvest has caused widespread quality issues, and Hurt noted that discounts at the elevators can be rather large for wet or damaged grain.

“The grain elevators send signals through their discounts and right now they’re really encouraging producers to bring in the crop below a certain (moisture) point,” he said. “The higher the moisture, the higher the penalty you’re paying.”

Based on a survey of six different Midwestern elevators, discounts right now run around 15-30 cents per bushel for 20 percent moisture, 32-55 cents per bushel for 25 percent moisture and 52.5-80 cents per bushel for 30 percent moisture.

For damaged corn, the elevators charged 5-15 cents per bushel for 10 percent damage, and 10-35 cents per bushel for 15 percent damage, with one elevator rejecting corn with 15 percent damage completely.

Whether it’s more economical to dry the corn on the farm or at the elevator depends on the elevator discounts, and since they all deal with moisture and damage differently, Hurt said it can pay off to shop around.

“If the elevator charges 3 cents per point (of moisture), that’s going to be pretty close to the on-farm drying costs, so that’s an elevator you may want to push some corn into,” he said, but if the elevator charges 5 cents per point, drying the grain on the farm will probably be more economical.

Producers also need to keep in mind that elevators generally shrink corn 1.4 percent per point of moisture over 15 percent, which is somewhat more than the actual shrinkage, and those charges add up over time. Hurt advised producers to watch the elevators’ discount schedules closely, especially if farmers having quality issues.

“Remember that every discount schedule can change any time without notice, so don’t assume that last week’s discount is the same this week,” he said.

Despite the late harvest and quality issues, the USDA is predicting a bumper crop. In its Nov. 10 Crop Production Report, the USDA predicted the corn crop will reach 12.9 billion bushels, which is down 1 percent from last month but still 7 percent above last year’s and second only to the 2007 crop.

The USDA also reduced its October yield estimate by 1.3 bushels, down to 162.9 bushels per acre, which would still be an all-time record.

The soybean crop is also on track to break records for both yield and total production, according to the USDA. Soybean production is forecast at 3.32 billion bushels, up 2 percent from the October report and up 12 percent from last year. Yields are expected to average 43.3 bushels per acre, up 0.9 bushel from last month and up 3.6 bushels from 2008.

The wet corn has caused some concerns among international end-users about the quality of U.S. grains.

“Reports of wet conditions throughout the Corn Belt have many customers on edge. We are getting a lot of questions about the potential ramifications this wet October could have on the quality of product our customers receive,” said Ken Hobbie, president and CEO of the U.S. Grains Council, in a statement.

He added USDA’s projections for one of the largest corn crops in history will help reassure international grain buyers that U.S. farmers will meet all domestic and global demands.

“We are not sugar-coating anything,” Hobbie said. “We are being very open and honest with our customers, but we do not want to create unnecessary anxiety.

“We are assuring our customers U.S. farmers will make it a priority to minimize any quality concerns this year.”