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West Central Indiana farmer has high hopes for this year’s crops

Harvest is getting underway for West Central Indiana farmer Paul Hodgen and despite weather challenges, he has high expectations for yields. “We got a little rain delay here this morning,” he says.  “I think it blew north of us and we spent yesterday day finalizing, getting things prepped and we’re going to start shelling corn here today.”

He says corn was testing about 32% moisture and he’s hoping it will be in the mid to upper 20’s today.  He tells Brownfield the corn condition looks better than average.  “There’s been some reports of tar spot moving in here,” he says.  “But it’s moved in so late in the season, it’s not going to hurt anything other than stalk quality or something like that, but from yield loss it won’t have an impact.”

He says soybean harvest will start in the next week or so.  “We’re going to probably desiccate beans tomorrow and Friday,” he says.  “So, we can start harvesting beans next week.” He says there’s been some brown stem rot starting to creep in in his area, but like the tar spot came in late enough it shouldn’t have an impact on yields.