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Mother nature just doesn’t want to treat us kindly this fall with quite a bit of snow accumulated last night in some areas of Lambton County. The sun is out now today, which will help to melt the snow, but we will need more sunny days to dry things up to help farmers get back in the fields in affected areas. Some farmers have changed over to corn from bean harvest because of better harvesting conditions, and to reduce higher chances/amounts of VOM. The longer the corn stays in the field, the worse it can become for rot.
So far we have only seen tops knocked off the corn from the snow (no cobs at this point). Hopefully we can avoid some high winds to prevent any further damage until we can get back into the fields. Due to some stalk rot issues this year, we recommend testing for stalk strength in your corn using the pinch or push test. If the corn failure rate is greater than 10%, you may want to consider harvesting early.
Pinch test
- Pinch the stalk between the lowest 2 internodes
- If the stalk collapses fails the pinch test
Push test
- Push stalk at about eye level to 30 degree angle
- If doesn’t spring back fails push test
Ear rots are being seen in some hybrids, but varies greatly by variety and location. Spraying fungicide would have helped reduce ear rot overall, but any infection could be linked to VOM if the ear rot is fusarium or gibberella. VOM tests are variable, but all samples so far have tested between 0.25-3.00% ppm at this point.
We have had a small amount of corn delivered to the elevator, with moistures ranging from 21-33%. Corn yield outlooks remains positive. Please check out our website for more information on drying and shrinkage tables.
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