Corn harvest predictions for pheasant opener?

[WildFan10]

Any thoughts on how much corn will be out by opener on the 12th? Planning to hunt SW MN near Marshall. Have a feeling it'll be a pretty late harvest this year, but if anyone lives in the area and has any idea about whether a bunch will come out in the next two weeks, I'm sure everyone planing to hunt the area would appreciate it. Thanks!

[fishattacker]

I live west of Willmar and I would say there will be very little if any out on pheasant opener. It is all still pretty wet so I am sure they are goign to wait for it to dry down.

[creepworm]

There are few people dabbling in the beans right now and even saw one small corn field harvested last weekend while driving through the Marshall area.

My guess, they should be going hard at it in the beans maybe starting this weekend or for sure next week.

Corn is extremely variable. Most corn was planted somewhat late and the cool summer did nothing to push it along. Corn harvest will be later than normal across the upper midwest. The wrench thrown in this is the frost a couple weeks ago. It did a number on some fields. Some varieties dry down well after frost and some just seem to stay at the same moisture for ever. Also, corn prices are low and propane prices are high, therefore, I would not be at all surprised to see an above average amount of corn left longer into the season, and possibly until spring. It just might not be worth the cost of drying it down.

I guess that is a long way of saying, we will have to see. They could be working on corn, they might not be. This heat certainly is helping.

[Eric Wettschreck]

Farmers in my area are taking out silage now. As far a when the combines will start it's a dump shoot. Warm weather is helping but ya never really know when they're going to start until they all start.

[lawdog]

Corn harvest? In my area...NOT EVEN CLOSE! The beans are barely turning yellow. We got a LONG way to go.

[Mr.Seaguar]

Forecast is for heavy precip in Oct and below avg temps. Might be a real late harvest with those two factors in mind.

[Rip_Some_Lip]

Saw a couple bean fields being picked today in my area. It will be a while for corn I am guessing. I would rather there be a lot of corn on opening weekend to preserve the birds because too many people are out the first weekend.

[BLACKJACK]

I spent a quite a bit of windshield time this weekend in Kandiyohi and Meeker counties, saw a few combines going after beans but no corn out unless they were chopping it. My guess is that most of the beans will go out in the next couple of weeks and some of the guys that are farming half the township will start taking corn out and drying it but there will be lots of corn out in the fields on pheasant opener. Which is ok, then its not such a slaughter and leaves more pheasants for the late season.

[PurpleFloyd]

It's going to be late this year. All the way from I90 by Austin to luverne up to Montevideo and east to the metro the beans are hardly touched, the corn still has a way to go to be dry and it doesn't sound like anyone is hitting the ground running tomorrow.

I don't look to have any corn out in my area aside from a few random pockets and it looks like it will be close to thanksgiving before we see the corn substantially completed.

It will mean that harvest of pheasant and deer will be down but that may help the population rebuild if we have a decent winter

[Eric Wettschreck]

There are a couple of fellas by my place, emphasis on a couple and not all, that have started taking out the beans. Nothing hot and heavy by any stretch. My gut tells me they'll get a little more serious aboot the beans this week but it's going to be a while yet before the combines start taking corn out.

[CaptainMusky]

The only corn gone in my area is silage. Beans, very few are gone. It was such a late spring you can guarantee the farmers are going to leave things in the field as long as they possibly can to try and get the most from the crop. I heard the beans took a savage beating with that early hard freeze back in Sept. Unfortunate for the farmers. It was too late to get a corn crop and just when the beans were getting close to peak, that freeze. Cannot win sometimes.

[brittman]

Beans really are coming off in many areas with the warm weather and now dry weather. Some areas the combines are running 24/7.

[PurpleFloyd]

Was up to Dawson today and back through Marshall to the Fairmont area. More got rolling the farther south I got.

[TylerS]

Hitting the beans hard in ND, but no corn down whatsoever. I'll wait until after deer season to really hit the ditch parrots.

[MNpurple]

Beans started getting hit around New Ulm in the last two days. I haven't seen any cornfields being touched. I have nothing against farmers and want them to have a good crop and get their fields harvested. But...the more corn that remains in the fields (especially between now and deer season and adjacent to public lands) sure protects some birds and makes for some wonderful late season hunting as hunter numbers begin to tail off.

[candiru]

Just a thought and a question on this. Is modern corn heartier, or is this just a freak weather shift? Is a "late" corn harvest the new normal? When I was young, I remember corn being harvested in early Sept. in some years and in all but very very wet years was wrapped up in mid Oct. Beans were done by duck opener.

In recent years the corn has been green into Oct. and it seems to take a real freeze and not just frost to kill it.

[creepworm]

The later harvest has a lot to do with people pushing maturities later to try to gain yield. Pushing 100 day corn up into the Hutchinson area an further north would have been considered insane 20 years ago. Now it is not that rare.

Also, the corn is healthier. Many years of breeding and many billions of dollars have given corn pretty good ability to fight off diseases. Along with fungicides becoming more common, greater use of fertilizer, and greater use of genetic traits to keep insects from stealing from the plant all lead to healthier plants.

This year, the late harvest can be blamed on freak weather. Late planting followed by cool weather did not allow the crop to progress at a normal pace, leading to late maturing.

[PurpleFloyd]

I started deer and pheasant hunting in the 70's and back then there was always corn in the fields into and through the zone 4 deer season. There were smaller parcels but the biggest combines had 4 row heads and they dumped into grain carts pulled by their pickup or a 3020 tractor.

The harvest Got faster when they got 6-8 row heads and started to use Semi's to haul the grain. At least around this area.

Now with 12 and even 16 row heads, multiple semi's and dedicated grain carts they can chew through a field pretty fast.

It seems like we are getting to the point now where operations are getting so big that the harvest itself is starting to spread back out because many of the bigger operators are at the point where they have more land than even the bigger machinery can handle.

[carpshooterdeluxe]

It seems like we are getting to the point now where operations are getting so big that the harvest itself is starting to spread back out because many of the bigger operators are at the point where they have more land than even the bigger machinery can handle.

Lots of truth to that.

[candiru]

We also need to remember In the 70's most of the farmers also had cows to milk and hogs to raise in addition to picking corn.

[401TE]

Any updates on harvest? Headed to western MN, near Lac Qui Parle, next Tuesday, wondering if I should bump the trip back a week...