Wisonsin crop outlook changes as season continues

Soybean crops are up, corn crops are down

LA CROSSE, Wis. (WKBT) — It’s a tale of two crops for Midwest farmers.

The US department of Agriculture says soybean crops are surpassing earlier record-breaking expectations.

Farmers are now expecting the harvest to be almost 4 billion bushels. That’s 31 million bushels more than what was estimated in October.

On the other hand, the corn corp is showing less promise than what was expected. The estimated crop actually dropped about 68 million to a little more than 14 billion bushels.

However, final numbers will be dependent on mother nature.

“Really our drying conditions get less and less as we move into the winter season right now. So how much moisture is going to come off some of that crop is a little dependent on how our weather continues here for the month of November and even to the first part of November,” said UW-Extension Agriculture Agent Steve Huntzicker.

The corn’s yield is not the only thing suffering. The price of corn is also down, making potential problems for farmers.

“It really affects everybody no matter what yield your bringing in and I think some other costs will be a factor this year, one of those being drying as we mentioned just because producers are waiting as long they can to reduce some of that drying costs and not cut into the bottom line,” said Huntzicker.

Huntzicker does say the current crop numbers are similar to numbers around the same time as last year.