Harvest picking up for area’s hail damaged, high-moisture corn crop

Corn harvest is starting to pick up in Chase County, a representative from Frenchman Valley Coop (FVC) said, but “it’s slow going right now.”
Henry Aufdenkamp of the FVC grain department said most of the crop they’re seeing right now is from fields that were damaged from hail.
“Of course you don’t know that for sure,” he said. “Soybeans are kind of getting rolling, but mostly hailed stuff for beans and corn.”
A large percentage of the corn harvest right now involves farmers attempting to recover as much corn as possible that was damaged from hail before high winds can do any more damage.
When corn gets hailed, the stalks become weak.
“Those high 40-50 mph winds we saw east of Imperial (Monday) can break those weakened stalks in half,” Aufdenkamp said.
Mike Bauerle was picking a circle southwest of Champion on Monday before the rain came.
“We saw anywhere from 17 to 25% moisture,” he said. “It’s too wet to go to the coop but too dry to go to the feedlot.”

To read more on this and other stories, please log in or subscribe to the digital edition. https://etypeservices.com/Imperial%20RepublicanID359/