08/26/24 Polka Dot Potholes Galore

This is the time of year when windshield road trips by farm fields can give deceiving perceptions of crop condition. Often, tall green corn along the road ditch shields blemishes further out in the fields. N loss, uneven stands and even potholes are masked from view. Even in 1993 there was a time in summer when crops looked better from the road so as to cause questions as to whether they were really as bad as they had looked earlier. Hope would be raised that yield expectations were too pessimistic. Then when the combines rolled, they confirmed that nothing had changed. They were terrible.   The ProFarmer crop tour confirmed that the top 2-3 tiers of Iowa counties were water damaged while very good crops existed south of Highway 20. The top 3 tiers of counties in Iowa produce 11% of the nation’s corn crop so it is a key region. The damage is progressive as you travel north to south from MN into IA. Crops north of Highway 10 and west of I-35 are the worst. The 2024 corn crop has wounds that have not healed. In the extreme ECB in Ohio there is drought impacted corn that is…