News

Exceptional crops for the wrong date

A crop farmer in Southeast Michigan says the 2019 crop year has put most growers in his area in a sour mood.

“At 52-years old, I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many prevent plant fields, it’s kind of depressing.”

Tim Stutzman in Lenawee County tells Brownfield in a typical year he would plant 2,000 acres of corn and soybeans each as well as wheat and alfalfa.

“We ended up with very few bean acres in, most of our bean acres are prevent plant acres, and we ended up putting our normal corn acres in because we have too many animals to feed.”   

He estimates about half of his acres are prevented plant.

“The crops look exceptional, just don’t look at the calendar.”     

While checking the fields, Stutzman tells Brownfield the corn crop is just starting to tassel and soybeans vary from flowering to filling pods.