DECEMBER RAINS A BOON TO KANSAS WHEAT
State and regional USDA offices released reports summarizing crop activity in December and rating the crop’s condition as the sun set on 2023. The USDA’s Northern Plains Regional Field Office in Manhattan, Kansas, US, said winter wheat in the nation’s top hard red winter production state was 5% excellent (5% in the previous report issued Dec. 11), 38% good (34%), 36% fair (36%), 12% poor (15%) and 9% very poor (10%). Improved conditions reflected a major precipitation event that soaked Kansas Dec. 13-15.
A peek at other hard red winter wheat states showed mostly improved conditions. The USDA in Oklahoma City rated the crop 67% in good-to-excellent condition as of Dec. 31 (53% on Nov. 26), 23% fair and 10% in poor-to-very-poor condition. The Department’s Colorado office said the Centennial State’s winter wheat was 61% in good-to-excellent condition (65% at end of November), 28% fair (33%) and 11% poor-very poor (compared with 2% poor, none very poor as of Nov. 26). The USDA office in Lincoln rated Nebraska winter wheat 48% in good-to-excellent condition as of Dec. 31 (49% on Nov. 26), 36% fair and 16% poor to very poor.
Out of the Sioux Falls office came a South Dakota report indicating winter wheat was 54% in good-to-excellent condition as of Dec. 31, up from 52% on Nov. 26. The USDA’s Montana Field Office (located in Lakewood, Colo.) said Montana winter wheat at the end of 2023 was 43% in good-to-excellent condition (58% a month earlier), that 27% of the crop had light-to-moderate wind damage and that 27% of the wheat had light freeze and drought damage.
The Dec. 26 US Drought Monitor showed the entirety of Missouri and Indiana were in severe or moderate drought or abnormally dry. Northern Illinois was in good shape, moisture-wise, but the southern half was mostly in severe drought mode. Northwest Ohio and southeast Michigan were in similar straits. Good-to-excellent conditions on soft red winter wheat on Dec. 31 were 73% in Missouri (71% on Nov. 26) and 55% in Illinois (72%), the USDA said.
(Link: WorldGrain)
