Ryan Miller, a regional Extension educator, said farmers are down to their "last handful of acres to harvest" in south central Minnesota.

In southeast Minnesota, regional Extension educator Lisa Behnken estimated that 85 percent to 90 percent of the corn has been harvested.

In the Le Center area, things are pretty quiet, said Darryl Wondra, location manager of Minnesota Valley Grain in Le Center. In the Montgomery area, some corn remains to be harvested, he said.

In the Wilmont area, corn harvest continues. A few farmers are finishing their harvest, reports the Wilmont-Adrian Co-op Elevator.

Wondra sums up the harvest in one word: wet.

They started drying corn at Minnesota Valley Grain when its moisture content was 32 percent to 33 percent. It's still awfully wet, Wondra said, with grain arriving at the elevator with 20 percent moisture. By this time of year the corn usually doesn't require artificial drying, he said.

The high moisture content of the corn has slowed harvest progress. Wondra said they dried 500 bushels an hour when moisture content was above 30 percent. It took two hours to dry a semi load of wet corn. Now, they are drying 900 bushels an hour.

The pace of harvest has slowed from November, Behnken said. The weather hasn't been cooperating and elevators are filling up. Dryer space and available storage space are limiting what elevators can accept, she said. Some elevators need to move grain out before accepting more.

All the moisture is going to cost farmers more on artificial drying. The good thing is that they have additional bushels, Behnken said.

Yields have been pretty good in southeast Minnesota, with corn yields averaging 175 to 200 bushels per acre. Moisture content is still in the 20s, she said, and it won't dry much further now with short days.

Miller said yields at two plots in south central Minnesota ranged from 155 to 215 bushels per acre. The plots are within 20 to 25 acres of one another. There's a huge variability in corn yields, he said. Frost may have shaved some yield from corn, he said.

Wondra said corn in the Le Center area averaged 190 bushels to the acre, which is real good, but it was wet.

Soybeans were also wet, he said.

"We dried beans, which I've never done before," Wondra said.

Soybean moisture content ranged from 16 percent down to 12 percent. Most were harvested during October. Yields averaged 48 bushels per acre, he said.

Behnken said soybean yields were average, ranging from 35 to 42 bushels per acre in field trials, with one trial close to 50. The yields reflect white mold, aphids, dry conditions and harvest losses, she said. It's likely some beans were left in the field with the wet, dry, wet, dry cycle the beans went through before farmers could get them harvested. Also, with the dry August and September, some top pods didn't fill very well.

In south central Minnesota, Miller said yields had a high variability. Soybean yields ranged from 30 to 50 bushels per acre.

Low test weight for corn has also been an issue this fall. The lowest price Miller heard received for corn was $1.68 per bushel after drying, shrinkage and dockage.

Farmers who still have grain in the field should notify their crop insurance agent because Dec. 10 is the end of insurance period, according to Kent Thiesse, vice president of MinnStar Bank in Lake Crystal. That's the deadline to maintain normal crop insurance coverage on the 2009 crop.

But on a positive note, more fall tillage has been done this year than last between combining and waiting for the crop to dry down, Behnken said.

Source: Agri News