Agricultural News
Damage From Snow and Cold Temps Likely in Western Kansas- But Simply Can't Gauged Now- The Day One Story from the Wheat Quality Council Tour
Wed, 03 May 2017 00:23:03 CDT
"It's too early to tell," was the theme of day 1 of the 2017 Wheat Quality Council's Hard Winter Wheat Tour across Kansas.
About 70 scouts left Manhattan early Tuesday morning, May 2, and made their way east to west across the state, ending up in Colby by evening. The average yield for the day between 18 cars and 222 stops was 43 bushels per acre. This was down from 47.1 bushels per acre over the same area last year.
One of those scouts was Chris Kirby with the Oklahoma Wheat Commission- and she talked Monday evening with Dave Green, Executive Vice President of the Wheat Quality Council about the discussion in Colby as scouts shared their findings. You can hear their conversation by clicking on the LISTEN BAR below.
Green told Kirby that many scouts on the tour seem to be disappointed that a determination of how much damage has been done because of the cold and the snow can not be made at this moment- but that the damage will take up to ten days before it really can be seen.
Wheat looked good early in the day, with adequate moisture and little disease pressure or damage.
But as the cars made their way into central Kansas, participants started seeing some of the effects of the April 22-23 and April 27 freezes that affected a big portion of the middle of the state.
These freeze events have been overshadowed in the news by a blizzard that affected the western third of the state over the weekend of April 29 through May 1.
However, the freezes may cause significant damage in many areas because the crop was in boot and early heading stages at the time. The extent of that damage doesn't fully show until a week to 10 days following the event. Scouts reported that more than half of the wheat they saw on day 1 was in the boot stage and 39% was headed. According to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, as of April 30, 44% of the wheat was headed statewide.
Wheat tour scouts also noted some disease pressure in central parts of the state, including stripe rust, which is a devastating fungal disease.
Day two of the tour will head south from Colby and go into southwestern Kansas- then move eastward with the second stop of the 2017 tour to be in Wichita on Wednesday evening.
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