Corn, Soybean Yields Stumble In Illinois

When Crop Tour scouts made it into Illinois fields on Wednesday, they discovered the corn and soybean crops are going to disappoint when harvest comes. What’s suffered the most? Soybeans. Scouts on the Farm Journal Midwest Crop Tour are really disappointed in the soybean crop.

“Soybeans have been really low,” Chris Narayanan of GA Capital tells Tyne Morgan, Host of the U.S. Farm Report. “Just in District 4, I think we dropped 37% pod count year on year,” Narayanan adds.

According to Pete Meyer of PIRA energy, the pods that should be on the lower part of the soybean plants “just aren’t there.”

Still, locals are optimistic that recent rains will help. 

“I have some fields that had more rain last night than they’ve had all summer,” says Dennis Wentworth, a farmer in McLean County, Ill.

United Prairie’s Kyle Meece adds that he wouldn’t be surprised if rains could take the crop back to the same yields they saw in Illinois last year.

While the corn crop isn’t a disaster, corn yields are definitely down in Illinois.

“We had trouble finding a field of 175 [bu. per acre corn],” Meyer says. “That’s all 225 [bu. per acre] dirt.”

Wentworth says he expects a good yield in his area to be 190 bu. to 200 bu. per acre. The temperature wasn’t the problem, but a lack of moisture has lowered the ear count, he says.