(Source: Grainnet.com)
This is Day 18 of the 2011 Kansas Wheat Harvest Reports, brought to you by the Kansas City Board of Trade, DeBruce Grain, the Kansas Grain and Feed Association, Kansas Association of Wheat Growers and the Kansas Wheat Commission.
According to the monthly Crop Report from Kansas Agriculture Statistics released Thursday, Kansas farmers will harvest 7.8 million acres of wheat this year.
With temperatures reaching 100 degrees for the second straight day, harvest is moving quickly through northern Kansas.
In more than three decades of farming, 2011 is the toughest year that KAWG Director Richard Kvasnicka, has ever seen.
His area of Logan County has been stricken by drought, with some areas receiving less than two inches of rainfall so far this year.
Kvasnicka has been harvesting wheat for three days; early on, the yield is better than what he expected, topping 30 bushels per acre.
However, Kvasnicka says that later-planted wheat is yielding poorly, from 15 to 25 bushels per acre.
Elevators in the area report test weights are good; 61 pounds per bushel for red wheat and 63 pounds per bushel for white wheat.
Protein averages about 13.
Larry Glenn, broker at Frontier Ag in Quinter, says half the area's wheat crop has been harvested in the last week, thanks to hot and dry harvesting conditions.
Test weights average 62 pounds per bushel and protein averages 12.5. Glenn says yields are more variable this year than normal because of the difference in planting dates.
Fields planted early are yielding around 40 to 45 bushels per acre, while fields planted later and immediate following a fall crop such as corn are yielding just 15 to 20 bushels per acre.
Glenn says farmers in Gove County should be finished with harvest in another 10 days.
Michael Jordan, KAWG director from the Beloit area, says harvest is about 90% done in Mitchell County.
Some fields were slow to ripen due to later emergence last fall and this spring - a problem that gets worse as harvest moves north.
Those same fields are lower in test weight and show signs of shriveled, non-ripe kernels.
In Mitchell County, the yield ranges from 30 to 70 bushels per acre, with a 45 to 55 bushel per acre average.
Harvest kicked into high gear in Smith County this week, according to Kandis Attwood at the Central Plains Co-op in Smith Center. Protein of the crop appears to be better than last year, although yields are not.
Test weight is 57-59 pounds per bushel and yields are still too early to project.
Harvest in the area is about 25% complete.