Kentucky Small Grain News

The Foundation is accepting entries for Winter and Spring Wheat. The deadline for Winter Wheat entries is May 15th with an early registration deadline of April 1st. The Spring wheat entry deadline is August 1st, with an early registration deadline of June 15th. The wheat contest is administered entirely online, and growers can register at www.yieldcontest.wheatfoundation.org.

Planting season is right around the corner for those in Kentucky growing winter wheat this year. Are you thinking about adjusting management practices by increasing seeding rates or adding phosphorus in anticipation of increased yields? Have you ever wondered how planting and harvest timings affect winter wheat yields? Over the past three years, Dr. Katherine Rod (former Plant and Soil Science graduate student) and Dr. Carrie Knott conducted research, funded by the KY Small Grain Growers’ Association, to answer these questions.

Beautiful early-fall conditions are resulting in another early corn harvest this year, and Kentucky grain farmers will soon decide if and how much wheat they will plant this fall. Compared to last year, there is a significant increase in wheat prices and a slight increase in soybean prices. These changes will make planting wheat more attractive relative to last year.

Read the latest news from the UK Wheat Science Group. This newsletter includes articles on wheat variety selection, residual herbicides, wheat management using historical climate data, and other useful resources.

Fertilizer applications can influence the overall yield and profit of crop production systems. Phosphorus (P), potassium (K), and lime additions for winter wheat production should be based on a good soil sampling and testing protocol. A soil test is recommended every two years or less, depending on the crop rotation and individual field knowledge.

It has been about eight days since the May8/9 freeze occurred. This is about the minimal time needed to begin seeing initial freeze damage. At this point, a fairly accurate assessment of damage should be able to be made, but as days progress the damage will become much more evident.

Some of the early-planted wheat and even some wheat planted ‘on time’ within the first two to three weeks of October is beginning to head. This is quite concerning given how early in the spring it is.

This spring, grain producers across the Midwest, including those in pockets of Kentucky, are dealing with grain quality issues in storage bins that are causing problems during unloading.

The USDA-NASS released its July Crop Production report today, based on the Agricultural Yield survey conducted at the beginning of month. The report includes information on Kentucky’s winter wheat production forecast which shows an increase of 24 percent from last year.

Know a Kentucky farmer or forester who goes above and beyond in the care and management of natural resources? Nominate them for the 2019 Kentucky Leopold Conservation Award®. 

Less than ideal weather conditions prevented many thousands of acres of wheat from being planted in Kentucky this fall. It also resulted in very dramatic developmental differences in Kentucky’s wheat crop.

Kentucky farmers harvested 19.8 million bushels of winter wheat during the summer of 2018, down seventeen percent from 2017. Yield is 66 bushels per acre, down eleven bushels from 2017. Farmers harvested 300,000 acres for grain, and another 150,000 acres were used as cover crop, cut as forage or abandoned. Kentucky ranks 18th in U.S. wheat production.