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Stalk integrity key as corn harvest approaches

Preparing for a variable harvest. 

Wyffels Hybrids area agronomy manager Mike Witt says there’s been a diversity of moisture across the Corn Belt this growing season.

“Being around central Iowa and into eastern Iowa, there’s been a lot of rain, sometimes too much. But if we trend up to northwest Iowa and into west-central Iowa and places like that, we’re in a fairly severe drought.”

And as harvest nears, he tells Brownfield stalk rot could be an issue in wet and dry areas.

“It can be different stalk rots, but at the end of the day that stalk integrity is really, really important. So for me if I’m looking at the dryer conditions, I have to look at which of my fields are standing. It cannot be a decision that’s based solely on planting date (or) solely on relative maturity. You can’t go by the calendar, you have to just go out and take it out.”

Brownfield interviewed Witt at the 2026 Farm Progress Show near Boone, Iowa.