by Julie Ingwersen
(Reuters) – Winter wheat yield prospects in northern Kansas were mixed compared to last year's drought-hit crop, with plants struggling to overcome the effects of dry weather earlier in the growing season, scouts on an annual crop tour said on Tuesday.
Yield-robbing diseases, particularly stripe rust, were apparent in fields in north-central Kansas. Scouts on one route of the Wheat Quality Council's tour found light to moderate stripe rust in three of the first five fields checked.
Since wet conditions tend to help diseases spread, pressure on yields may increase in some areas after heavy rains fell Monday parts of Kansas, the top U.S. winter wheat producer. The diseases may offset the moisture's benefits.
“The rain is definitely going to benefit the crop, but we are seeing a lot of variability. The high-end yield potential isn't there,” said Justin Gilpin, chief executive of the Kansas Wheat Commission, who is on the tour.
“The drought we had before has already limited the yields,” added Romulo Lollato, an agronomy doctoral student at Oklahoma State University who is on the tour.
Scouts in one car traveling through Riley, Clay, Washington, Cloud and Republic Counties in north-central Kansas made six field stops and calculated an average yield of 36.3 bushels per acre (bpa), below the year-ago tour calculation along the same route of 39.6 bpa.
Another tour group traveling slightly farther south made four stops and calculated an average of 44 bpa, above the year-ago tour average for the same route of 34.4 bpa.
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Source: Reuters
