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Soil crust an issue as corn emerges across north Iowa

Soil crusting is a concern for farmers in north Iowa who planted corn ahead of Easter weekend.

Josh Hitzhusen of rural Rockwell says it’s too early to tell if emergence is uneven.

“We don’t know if the corn is going to leaf out underground or if it’s going to come through. Just from Monday to (Wednesday) morning, some of these fields look 50 times better for sure than they did at the beginning of the week just from getting some heat and giving that corn a chance to get through the ground.”

He tells Brownfield some growers are using a rotary hoe to loosen up the soil.

“I took our planter out with the closing wheels in a couple areas and drug it around to try to break the crust up on some headlands. The jury is still out as to whether we helped it or not, but we knew the corn was small enough at that point that we weren’t going to do any damage to it by dragging a piece of equipment across.”

Hitzhusen says he’ll evaluate stand counts to determine if replanting is necessary.