HEBRON, Neb., Aug 22 (Reuters) – Corn yield potential in southeastern Nebraska was trending above average and better than in 2016 as timely rains and cool weather during August helped the crop recover from a hot and dry July, scouts on annual tour found on Tuesday.
But soybean pod counts were down from a year ago and below average on one route on the Farm Journal Midwest Crop Tour.
Corn yields were seen at 171.16 bushels per acre (bpa), based on surveys of five fields in Adams, Nuckolls and Webster counties.
A year ago, scouts calculated yields at 155.05 bpa. The tour’s three-year average for the area is 159.22 bpa.”It is not a bad corn crop that we have been looking at,” tour leader Chip Flory said. “As we move to the east, we are seeing more stress.”
Among U.S. states, Nebraska last year was the third-biggest U.S. corn producer and the fifth biggest for soybeans.
The U.S. Agriculture Department has projected the state’s 2017 corn harvest at 1.739 billion bushels, which would account for 12.3 percent of total U.S. production.
The USDA has forecast the Nebraska soybean harvest at 327.7 million bushels, which would be equivalent to about 7.5 percent of the U.S. crop.
Scouts do not estimate soybean yields but instead calculate the number of pods in 3-foot-by-3-foot (91-cm-by-91-cm) plots to gauge yield potential.
Soybean pod counts on the route averaged 961.58, compared with 994.35 in 2016 and the tour’s three-year average of 1,029.52.
On another route that made stops in Gage, Seward and Saline counties, corn yields averaged 157 bushels per acre and soybean pod counts 930.
Scouts on the Farm Journal tour collect samples in corn and soybean fields for four days, with the eastern leg starting in Columbus, Ohio, and the western leg starting in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.