More and more Vermilion County farm fields are showing that “we’ve already been harvested” look. And with nothing but sunny skies and high temperatures back in 70s in the forecast for most of the next several days, the pace may pick up even more. But Tom Fricke of the Vermilion County Farm Bureau says the bit of a snap this week to more autumn like weather didn’t bother anyone.
AUDIO: The cold temperatures don’t slow you down. It maybe keeps you from starting as early in the morning as you might otherwise, until the dew’s gone. But we had a tremendous week last week of nearly running every day. And then it looks like this week’s shaping up just the same.
Fricke says, once things have wrapped up harvest wise sometime in, what looks like could be early November; then the issue will become “we need colder weather for field work.”
AUDIO: With the warmer temperatures, you have to wait until you’re cold enough, long enough, to be able to do any fall applied anhydrous nitrogen fertilizer. So, we’ll wait until that forecast comes along to deal with that, I suppose. The main focus right now is to get the harvest done. And we seem to be doing that in a very expedient, timely basis.
Another long range concern continues to be that there could soon be problems with elevators being at or near capacity. Fricke reminds us it’s an entire chain reaction from slowed down barges on the river, all the way back to where the grain comes from.
AUDIO: The lack of moisture’s helping the harvest proceed, but it’s also impacting export channels that we use. And the river is definitely one of them for Illinois. And so, as river terminals aren’t able to empty out as fast as they normally can, it backs up the whole supply chain.
As projected, the harvest does indeed seem to be solid so far. Fricke says that soybean wise, for example, there are reports within the county of high 70s and 80s bushels per acre. Fricke says there aren’t too many corn numbers being turned in yet, because farmers have been so busy it’s been hard to take a break and talk about it.
