Corn, soybean harvest shifts into high gear with dry weather

Iowa farmers took to their fields last week, taking advantage of dry weather over most of the state to complete the harvest of this year's corn and soybean crops.

Seventy-one percent of the corn crop was harvested for grain or seed through Sunday, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's weekly crop and weather report. That's still four days behind last year, but two weeks ahead of the five-year average.

Warm daytime temperatures and mostly gentle breezes promoted grain dry-down. The average moisture content of corn is estimated at 17 percent and the moisture content of corn is estimated at an average of 16 percent.

Soybean harvest advanced to 95 percent complete, behind last year's 97 percent but over two weeks ahead of the average pace. More than 90 percent of the soybean crop has been harvested in every district except the East Central district at 88 percent and the southeast district at 89 percent.

Grain movement was fairly brisk with 54 percent of Iowa seeing a moderate to heavy mount of corn and soybeans being transported from the field to storage. As the harvest season heads into the home stretch, 93 percent of the state reports adequate or surplus off-farm storage capacity and 87 percent of Iowa reporting adequate or surplus on-farm grain storage capacity.

Hay supplies are considered short across 22 percent of the state. Livestock producers continued moving cattle to stalk fields.

Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey said some corn and soybean producers are moving into post-harvest mode.

"With the dry weather harvest continued to advance rapidly and many farmers are starting to move onto fall field work, such as tillage, installing conservation practices and fertilizer applications," Northey said.