Wednesday, June 24, 2026

We went back to the wheat field yesterday about 2pm.  The fields were soft in some spots, but better than I expected after the Sunday night 3″ rain.  We were able to run later in evening and got along better than expected.  One field was mostly flat, and that showed up in the reduced yield for the wheat. This is very apparent this year; wheat does not like ‘wet feet’.  But up on the slopes of the hillsides, we are grateful for the yields… not great, but okay.  The grain was wet enough that it all ran through the dryer.  One concern is the test weight, or a measure of the grain’s density.  Normal TW for SRW is 60 pounds, but this year, the number is diminished, running 56 to 58.  With each rain event, the TW goes down.   That can create a situation for a dockage in price at the market.  It is urgent that we get this wheat in bin asap.

This big flat area of the Roberson farm saw the yield impacted by the wet weather.

Here, we are opening the field at Waldo late Tuesday afternoon.  Yields were not-so-bad on this hilly field. 

As it turned out, harvest progress on Tuesday was better than we expected Tuesday morning.  We will be back at it again today… more rain is predicted for Thursday night.  If we have a very good and productive day today and tomorrow, we could get the wheat harvest completed ahead of this next rain event.  Let’s hope so!

After wheat harvest, next will come the planting of double-crop soybeans (DCB).   We don’t have enough manpower to do that while harvesting, so it waits for the combines to finish and then we plant DCB.  Right now, though, the fields are too soft and wet to plant into.  We will need some sunny days to dry the soil surface and allow the beans to plant properly.   They are predicting high 90s temps next week, and some extended dry days.  That should give us the window we need to plant our DCB.

The weather this work week has been beautiful!