Fall rains make for late harvest

by Peter Jakey–Managing Editor

The persistent fall rains have been causing problems for area producers in getting crops out of muddy fields.

As of Tuesday, some producers had been waiting for more than a week or more to get machinery rolling again, but standing water was still present in many low lying areas of fields.

“The moisture has been the big challenge,” said James DeDecker, Michigan State University Extension educator. “The soil has not had a chance to dry. We have not had sunny warm days to facilitate drying either.” Couple that with a late planting season.

DeDecker said producers have been waiting to harvest a number of products.

ON A calm but chilly Tuesday afternoon, members of the Wilk family harvested a field northwest of Metz. That’s Cliff running the harvester, while his son Wade is in the hopper truck that will haul the load to the warehouse. (Photo by Peter Jakey)

“Potatoes are pretty close to being wrapped up,” said DeDecker. “They found some opportunities. Sometimes it comes down to being aggressive. You would rather not be in the field in terms of soil compaction and ruts you are causing in the field, but you have to get after it at some point.”

“There have been a lot of issues with trying to get trucks off the field,” said potato farmer Clifford Wilk, near a field along 634 Highway, northwest of Metz.

A tractor had to pull a hopper-truck from a soft spot in the field. “We are wrapping it up. We only have a few more acres. Another day and we will have it.”

Wilk says it looks to be an average crop. “It’s nothing special. I thought the tonnage would have been a little bit better considering the summer we had, but it is what it is.”

DeDecker said the wait now is for beans and corn. “Most of that in Presque Isle County, and the surrounding counties, remains in the field,” said DeDecker.

In Hawks, the Rhode family has only

been out once in three weeks. They started Tuesday, but suffered an equipment breakdown.

The elder of the family, Chuck Rhode, who harvested his first field 50 years ago, believes there still could be quality in their dark red kidney beans.

“We are going to have to dry them,” said Rhode. “It is going to take time to dry and it is expensive. We have drier that we would have to put them on, but they would have to dry slow.”

Chuck is hopeful for dry and sunny weather in the coming days as was forecasted at the start of the week. Handling the operations these days is Zeke and Herb Rhode.

“We had delayed planting, later maturing crops, now this moisture,” said DeDecker. “Aside from harvest concerns is the issue of getting late season crops like wheat planted. So, if they are waiting to get the soybeans off, and they can’t get wheat planted, for every day after Oct. 1 you start losing yield potential up to a bushel a day. It is just something that builds and compiles and causes problems down the road.”