Windows vastly different for producers in Nebraska and Michigan

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[Yeager]

We are going into the field again this week on the MTM podcast. Hello, I'm Paul Yeager, glad to have you here. It looks like many of you really like these reports that we have done from the ground. And this is already been a pre-scheduled slot that I was having in the podcast, was to talk to our farmers that we talked to in the spring, Bryan Pippitt and Donald Oesterle. We're going to catch up with them, find out the story in Nebraska, find out the story in Michigan. And I'm going to tell you two pretty different tales right here, except there is one commonality between the two, and we'll get into that in a moment. The last couple of weeks we've talked to a producer in Iowa and in Michigan about how much rain they've had. Go back and watch that. Also, we are getting ready to launch something very fun. And I want those of you who watch and listen to this podcast to be a part of my test group. Send me an email at Paul.Yeager@IowaPBS.org. or you can direct message me on Twitter or on the Facebook page of Market to Market. And, give me your email address. I'll have it if you email me and I'm going to send you something. just a tiny little tease. That's all I'm going to say. More is coming on the TV show very soon, which is produced here at Iowa PBS in the market to mark a TV show. Bryan Pippitt is the producer in northeast Nebraska. Corn is the big deal for him. we'll also talk about soybeans. We got him off the sprayer. He was kind enough to pause before we got into the field again. He's been on quite a run there, and Donald Oesterle in Michigan, totally different story from him. We're going to start with Don, about what has happened there this year for him. And just one thing keeps happening over and over again. New episodes of this podcast come out each and every Tuesday. Let's get to our conversations. 

[Yeager] You're inside. Your clothes look like town clothes. You don't look like you got any dust on you. My seeing the internet right here, Donald.

[Oesterle] Yep, yep, you're seeing it, right? We're, We are not doing anything today. Nor will be. Will we be for probably at least a week. So we got quite a bit of rain over the last 24 hours. So 4 to 5in. So. We'll be doing regular people do.

[Yeager] The last time we chatted, you were trying to basically get in rainstorms to plant, and I and I watched the weather and I felt bad that I probably took you that 20 minutes. Probably cost you some time in the field, but you had, again, small windows this spring.

[Oesterle] Yeah. Small windows. We never really, We never. It's been that way. All spring. We never get any stretch in whether it was planting or spring or hay. It was all a couple days here, a couple days there. So, where we don't get too tired so we get plenty of rest.

[Yeager] There's no big sprints for you.

[Oesterle] No, there's been no marathons this year. It's just, you know, just, you know, just little dashes.

[Yeager] You, is everything in and planted?

[Oesterle] Yep. We got everything in, in good shape. It was, the last little bit. Got in June 4th. So, just a few days later than what we wanted. But we were pretty happy.

[Yeager] And if I remember correctly, that June 4th is ahead of last year's late plan that you had, right?

[Oesterle] Yep yep yep. Last year we were like June 10th or 11th I think.

[Yeager] So improvement?

[Oesterle] Oh yeah. Well, last year we had zero rain in June. So that's not the case this year. We've had plenty of rain in June.

[Yeager] Okay. So everything's up or everything's in. Everything came up. Is everything done that you want done to your crop?

[Oesterle] Yeah. Pretty. We just have a little bit more spraying we were hoping to get done before we got all this water. just to touch up some beans, but everything else is done. Well, scratch that, we. It's not done wheat, but wheat is going to be, sitting for a second.

[Yeager] And that's always wheat is, I won't say finicky, but that's is probably as close of a word. It has a much less margin for error. Right? 

[Oesterle] Yeah. Well what we run into a lot this week goes right to the mill's right here. And so it's all on quality. So if you have good quality wheat, you can get rid of it easy. If it turns poor quality, like if it starts to sprout in there then you're fighting it the rest of the year just to get it out.

[Yeager] So what's the target date to get the wheat out?

[Oesterle] Well, it would have been this weekend, but, we're hoping to get back on next week. You know, I don't know if we will or not. We. I've to be honest, I've never had this much rain at one time on this farm. So I don't know how long it's going to take for it to dry out.

[Yeager] And you say 4 to 5in in the last 24 hours. It's June. It's not supposed to happen that way. Know you, you had the remnants of a hurricane come through.

[Oesterle] Yeah. That's, I didn't realize that until I looked at the weather page and think, where's all this rain coming from? And then. Then they told me, and, so, but, yeah, so, I mean, this is farming, you know, you did you did play the cards you dealt. So that's what we're going to do.

[Yeager] Because 4 to 5in of rain before any crop is a week to two weeks out from harvest to me, don't I don't.

[Oesterle] Oh, yeah. Good thing. I mean I mean. We're two weeks away from actually getting on the fields in decent shape. We're hoping we could skin the combines of crossed next week to just to get the weed off. But we're two weeks away from being able to do much of anything. There's so much water sitting out there.

[Yeager] And we kind of overuse the phrase, and it's kind of outdated. Knee high by the 4th of July was your corn that we hit it or was it behind? 

[Oesterle] No, we hit it. Yeah. Everything was knee high. And some of it was, we actually had the first stuff we planted starting to tassel around the 4th of July. So that's, that usually means pretty good corn around here.

[Yeager] So and that has to be in good shape.

[Oesterle] Yeah. That's ahead of schedule for us. Yeah. Why would your first fields would be that, you know, July 10th, July 12th and we're ahead because of the heat units we've had.

[Yeager] So yeah, that's what he's going to ask us. Why is the corn ahead? Yeah.

[Oesterle] Yeah. We had extra heat units in May and we had extra heat units in June. And the crops just loved it. So, we were sitting really pretty in that regards. Really. This, this big rain that we got is the only major thing that we've bumped into. We've dealt all the other rains seem to get off the water got off just in time for us to get stuff done. But this one, this one's not going to.

[Yeager] What about the beans? How did they go in?

[Oesterle] Pretty good. Beans went in pretty good. They, as you know, they don't get too crazy about being too wet. Like the corn has been loving it. The beans, they're probably a little bit shorter than normal. We're just getting, some of them are just starting to flower, so they're probably, we've had better beans before, but they're still. They still look pretty good. Before the rain. We'll see how they come.

[Yeager] Yeah. Before the rain. they need some heat, though. Now. That's why they're going to.

[Oesterle] Need heat now. Everything's going to need heat now. We got some 80 degree days coming up, and then they got, the seven day forecast has it back down in the 70s, so maybe they'll be wrong and we can stay in the 80s.

[Yeager] You need them to be wrong with less rain.

[Oesterle] That's exactly right. Exactly. And that's. Well, that's the thing. When it goes back, when it lower the temp lower is again there. We got another 50% chance of rain. So I hope not. We'll really be wet then if we get more rain.

[Yeager] Now you know your area well but some years stand out more than others. Does this year remind you of anything in your history?

[Oesterle] well, we were, before this rain. It was, I think it was 20. Well, we had quite a stretch between 2014 and 2016 where we had really good corn yields. And we were headed for some good corn yields whenever we can. Tasseled by the 4th of July around here is always good. And we're tasseled. We were tasseled. And by 4th of July. So that usually means good corn. We'll we're just gonna have to wait and see. Now.

[Yeager] What about hay?

[Oesterle] Hay's been pretty good. first cutting. First cutting was pretty good. second cutting is pretty good. It's just a little bit better than average. It wasn't like it wasn't fantastic, but it's better than average. So we're and it came up in good quality. So we were happy with it.

[Yeager] But again once you put it down that's usually when it rains has that. Oh yeah. And yet for you yeah.

[Oesterle] One field we put it down. It rained. well, but then it turned, like, really hot right after the rain. So we were able to get it off in pretty good time. And it wasn't too bad. But yeah, we we had some of that.

[Yeager] So I'm sure that, the markets have given you all sorts of, distraction. Right? Watching things go down. How's that? How you handling that?

[Oesterle] Oh, that's just I mean, it's like a bad movie. So if you don't turn it off, you just keep watching it. So, so it's, you know, we've got some protection in place, but, you know, I wasn't exactly prepared for some $4 corn, so, I'm hoping for a little, little something, but we'll see. The, everything's been kind of down. Canola is weaker than it usually has been in the past few years. cattle is down this week, so. And we got a bunch of rain this some may change the channel.

[Yeager] The hits keep coming.

[Oesterle] Yeah. Yep.

[Yeager] I think before you know it, it's coffee shop opinion. It's neighbor chatter, what's the sentiment right now around your part of the world. What's everybody most concerned about?

[Oesterle] Tthe everybody was there weren't really a lot of concerns until we had all this rain. And then we get all this rain. And I was talking to some of my friends this morning, and they're like, yeah, we're flooded now, so we're not sure what's going to happen. And then, this morning we found our first field that had tar spot in it. And we haven't had good luck with that. So I texted my buddy and I said, hey, I found out this morning. And he goes, thanks for ruining my day. So. So yeah, we've been hit pretty bad in some spots by car spots, so nobody's excited. Their first, the first couple, projections they did and actually wasn't even going to get here till later on, which we've had to get here late, and we're just fine, early. Like this. It doesn't work out so well. So especially now that we got 4 to 5in of rain, it's going to be hard to get. Some corn fields are going to need to be sprayed next week, and I don't know if we'll be able to get on there yet or not.

[Yeager] So not can you do any of that from the air? Is it going to have to be.

[Oesterle] So you can do a little bit from the air? You really got to set. You got to get lucky because there's a lot of orchards on the west side of the state. you know, they got more money than we do. So. So most guys, they can stay busy staying right over there. So they don't usually come over. Sometimes you'll get one that's not busy, be able to come over, but we don't usually have good luck with it. So that's why we had everything set. We haven't set up to spray our own. But we shall see.

[Yeager] Yeah. Because if you can't get over it, you can't get it done in. That problem just becomes, again, it's about those windows for you this year.

[Oesterle] Yeah, exactly. It's about the windows. Are we going to get that window to get it done? So, we'll see how long it takes. We had 3.5in a couple of weeks ago and it came off pretty well, but we weren't quite as saturated as we are now. So. We'll see. You didn't exactly catch me on the best day.

[Yeager] Yeah, I know, I'm like, okay, let's see. let's end with, I said, frustrated. Let's end with something positive. Is there anything that we have that's, gone? Well, have you been working on maybe your chip game or in the, in the golf simulator, you know.

[Oesterle] You know, I, my last round wasn't fantastic, but the round before that, I did some 50, which for me, you know, is pretty good, but for not, not, not 18 for nine.

[Yeager] So again, that's still good. you should. Yeah. You should be okay with that.

[Oesterle] Oh that's been. Well my grandkids were over today. So that was the good part.

[Yeager] There you go. They probably think this is great. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Go out. Yeah. Play in the mud.

[Oesterle] Yeah. That's exactly right. Yeah. Play in the mud.

[Yeager] Then you can, you can take out the frustration spraying them down with the hose.

[Oesterle] Yeah. Yeah.

[Yeager] Cleaning them on out. Yeah. Why am I wet, grandpa? Why do you keep squirting me in the face?

[Oesterle] Yeah.

[Yeager] You had mud up there.

[Oesterle] Yeah, exactly.

[Yeager] All right, Donald. Well, let's hope, things turn. You know, years have a way of balancing themselves out some way. So you have to think, gosh, you know, there's going to be some heat coming, and we're going to get this thing turned.

[Oesterle] Yeah, yeah, we get some heat. Oh, well, we can't take too much land right now because everything will just blow right over. But maybe just a tad of wind. Okay.

[Yeager] That'll do, that'll do. All right, Donald, good to talk to you. Thank you so much.

[Oesterle] Yep. You too. Thanks.

[Yeager] How's the wind? Is that going to be a problem with spraying today?

[Pippitt] It's been an absolutely ideal week for spraying. I don't think we've gotten above eight mile an hour winds all week. Literally. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. Been perfect. Mid 80s, no wind.

[Yeager] There are not many people that have used the word ideal in describing this year at all. So how many ideal days if you had Bryan.

[Pippitt] Well, this has been ideal for spraying. We did not have all ideal days during planting, but we were more fortunate than a lot of others. I feel like so it was stress all the time, but considering I think things look pretty good and I think maybe were through the most stressful part of it, I hope.

[Yeager] You are in northeast Nebraska, and your parallel is even to where some of the heaviest rain has fallen in the Midwest this year. Yeah. what were you in that path? Did you have a lot of water? 

[Pippitt] We've had a lot of rain, and we've had one big event, but the rest has been able to handle. I've had some big rains that we didn't get all soaked in, but we had a 3.5in rain, I believe, April 16th. But that was our biggest volume at once. And I'd say we're probably pushing 20 inches of rain since planting or shortly before planting, but it's come not all at once like some of our neighbors have. We haven't had a lot of storms yet, and for the most part a little excessive at the time. But after last year, we weren't going to complain either. So we took it, managed and got it in.

[Yeager] I guess I'm going to guess that 20in of rain since April would be equivalent to what you had the previous two years, almost combined?

[Pippitt] Oh yeah, maybe more. But yeah, very close.

[Yeager] okay. So walk me through planting. you had this April 16th event. Had you started by then?

[Pippitt] Yeah, we had one quarter of corn planted April 30th, and we sprayed it. Yeah, it must be April 15th. So our first rain was the night of April 15th, the morning of April 16th. And that was a big, heavy shot. And then we had a lot of rain that week. I believe we had six inches total for that week. Three and a half and one shot and then two more. You had your inch and a half rains and then we got going again April 22nd, third and fourth. Plant more corn. And then we rained out between like ten days, two weeks. And then we had that last window where we finished everything and we were done May 19th, I believe 18th or 19th with corn and beans. Both on the same day in May.

[Yeager] You were done in May, though.

[Pippitt] Well, I say we were done with the first time we went. We didn't actually replant. Well, I guess what we replanted, we didn't replant whole fields. We planted wet spots and some up to three times. And we sprayed a field yesterday that we had spots that just never did come smile spots. But I yeah. So the first time the first go around we were done. I think it maybe was May 18th if I remember, May 18th or 19th with both corn and soybeans. 

[Yeager] That's still way ahead. Many other people though, you have to feel fortunate about that.

[Pippitt] Yeah, we planted in what I would call drought conditions last year. We were still done about the same time. So I mean, yeah, our planting date was not that far behind, a little slow emerging. It seemed like we had that first plant, a corn field I believe was in the ground for maybe four weeks before we had it start coming out. And it was probably our most uneven emergence, just probably too cold in the ground, too long. But it's really turn now. It's probably a week away from tasseling, and it really has. It looks a lot better than it did when we kind of scratching our heads the first few weeks. Think about what we're going to do with it. But we left it and we planted maybe a couple acres of it, and now it looks pretty good. So I think it's going to be alright.

[Yeager] Is that your field behind you? Over to your right.

[Pippitt] This is my uncle's field. But yes, it we farm with him. So. Yeah.

[Yeager] And he had some tassels on there right.

[Pippitt] Yes. This one was planted April 22nd. This is on the second one. Do we planted? So, yeah, this was, it's an early maturity too. I'm not sure what he planted. Maybe 104 day, but yeah, he's. And we're by a grow that helps the whole field. Not tassel, but around the grove it is tassel and they're out. So.

[Yeager] Well yeah. Tell me about that early stuff. The stuff before the rain. Because at least in this area, the stuff that was planted in that very first window looked the best. All in June. I don't know if it'll continue that way, but how has it been there for you?

[Pippitt] I would say the same thing here and the I would say our second window, because we planned one on April 13th, that one sat in the ground for an extra ten days. And these other ones. But the stuff we planted April maybe was 21st, I know April 22nd, third, fourth and fifth. I think that one that we had about 3 or 4 days of planting that stuff all look good, looks good. It still does look good.

[Yeager] I had a guy ask me yesterday, he heard it in Nebraska that the pivots aren't really running, like they normally would by this time. What's your report from your area about pivots and how many are running?

[Pippitt] Yeah. That's correct. I know we mentioned on our earlier chat that you want to see a pivot up close and the sun that we didn't get cooperative lighting but I background the neighbor has he is running a pivot in the cornfield behind us. But he's also putting on his nitrogen. I think the only pivot on radish right now, they're putting on fertilizer through the pivot. I don't think it is just running to water yet. I think it's all I would say. There's a I don't know, we got some neighbors running, but I know they're all putting on fertilizer with the pivot. So I think that's the only ones running that I know of right now.

[Yeager] That has to be almost unheard of.

[Pippitt] Yeah. Last year we were, heavily irrigating in June. We had made a few circles already in June. So yeah, we're in our profile for and on the field just a half mile south of here, we have a corn field with a soil probe, moisture probe in it, and it still says we're like 91% full. I just checked it before you cause I wondered if you'd ask him. So, yeah, I don't know. We it sounds maybe the extended forecast sounds a little bit dry. Not overly hot, but we may run next week just to run just so we're. But our profile is probably, I suppose has been in maybe three years. I don't know for sure two years. So I mean, even if we do start irrigating, at least we have something to work with this year. Last year we were just irrigating to keep the ground wet, and now we have subsoil moisture this year. So we're way from their head than we have in the past years.

[Yeager] You remember my obsession about talking about pivots because I just don't know anything about them, I don't know, do you plan a different number and does that number get impacted when it's natural moisture and it's not pivot moisture?

[Pippitt] No. And like I say, we do like hybrids that are better, you know, maybe push them a little bit higher yields. But, like dad always says, he just says, a half inch of rain is better than three quarters of an inch of the pivot. It just it's more consistent. It's even it takes you two to 3 to 4 days to make a circle of pivot. So, you know, you're irrigating during the day. At night. It's not all consistent. You don't know if you're getting exactly what you're putting on. So I call them a supplemental. You know they help but they're not perfect. And we're glad we have them. But yes, we do select certain varieties for pivots to try and push them. But rain is just better for everything.

[Yeager] It also keeps the source, moisture. Does it buy you another period of time, I'm not going to say a year or ten on a year. You don't have to run a pivot, but it certainly helps.

[Pippitt] And we mentioned that in our earlier chat, too, that we have a pivot that has two wells that run one pivot, it runs out of water on a typical year. And I say it'll be interesting to see what that one does this year, because last year we had to quit running it every so many hours just because we were pushing air and we could hear it was sucking air and just wasn't. The pattern wasn't right, and I just wasn't doing a lot of good. And it'll be interesting to see what. Yeah, I would guess since March we probably have had 22 or 23 inches of rain on most of our farms. So that's our annual rainfall in a matter of a month and a half, two months. So yeah, it should charge up. The groundwater should be up. I mean, it should just help with everything.

[Yeager] Does it also charge up your optimism?

[Pippitt] Yes. But I would like it to keep reading to you because we played in some not ideal conditions, and we lucked out because it kept doing planting, but we planted, that's what I, what my comments. I said the spring is after pointing to a drought last year, it's almost like you're pointing to a drought. That is when it's wet, just a lot more forgiving. We planted some stuff very wet this year, but the rain did come out. It looks good, but if it doesn't come here right, I wonder if we'll have some light problem show up that probably were affected by the planter, but so far we haven't seen anything like that yet. And maybe we won't. Maybe we will. I can't tell you that, but I would like it to keep raining. Two that would definitely keep my optimism up.

[Yeager] You are, I think you said, almost ten days without measurable rain and you might have a little bit moving forward. That's still not cause for concern that I'm hearing. But we're also mid-July already. And that has to make you feel good about just where you're at and in relationship to. If you wouldn't even need to flip the switch.

[Pippitt] Yeah. It'll do a lot more good this year because like I say, last year we were irrigating just I mean, you're keeping the ground won't be had nothing, you know, in the profile. And now that we're sort of there, it just makes irrigating more efficient too, because it hasn't been windy. We're starting to get some more heat, which we needed, but say it's not like we're getting 95 and dry and turn our weather in either. So I mean, like right now we waited till 830 this morning, start spraying because it was just soaking wet. Wet prior what we've been getting do and just we haven't seen any corn. It looks stressful. Last year we had corn in the corners that were already shriveled up like pineapples. This year we haven't seen that yet. And it just has to be a lot more good for everything. It's just making us more efficient. And the corn moving along was not stressing out. We're yeah, we've missed storms missed here. We missed everything. So I don't want to get ahead of myself. But so far we've it could have been a lot worse. So I'm, I would say pleased with where we're at.

[Yeager] I'm going to guess the hail. you might have some friends that either were impacted or know people that were impacted.

[Pippitt] Yes. And some of the people more central Nebraska on the interstate, Kearney that way. I think they had two rounds of hail last week. I think one maybe Tuesday before the fourth and one maybe like the Friday after fourth. I'm not sure about the dates, but I think there was about two rounds at some of those towns down there. And I don't have anybody real close, I know. But from stuff I saw on Facebook and stuff, it looked like it was very serious, very, very hard on crops.

[Yeager] You're not in a huge bean area, but there are soybeans around you. What's the story with them?

[Pippitt] Yeah, and even soybeans like this. Good. This year too. I would say a lot of guys on here probably now and, a lot of other 50, 50, but a lot of the bigger producers, I would say it's a lot heavier corn. But, yeah, a lot of guys around us seem like the more popular they plant beans. First there was a guy that planted beans, probably April 11th or 12th, a couple days before we planted, and they were slow to come out. They look the best, but now they've really come a long way. He's got some, he got some. They obviously had plenty of moisture, but it seems like stuff is really growing and it's just getting to be that time too. But we've had a lot of mild degree days lately, since it rained. And it seems like that's maybe what we were missing in the month of June. We had plenty of rain, but we just didn't have the heat that we have had in the past and now supposed to be 90 tomorrow. 90. Well, all and really and I think things are really good, things have really changed even in the last week. Things have just really shot up.

[Yeager] That's crop making weather when you get there.

[Pippitt] Yeah. It's just that's what I say. I don't even like to get excited, but it's just it's really been we've been pretty fortunate where we're at because you had to go very far in your direction. They've had storms, heavy rains, flooding, dried out spots and I know things can change, but so far we've been a little heavy on rain drain planting. But since then it's really have no complaints. I would say.

[Yeager] Yeah, well everybody who's watched this, they heard the first interview with Donald in Michigan where he just can't stop getting rain. he just had another a rain event 4 to 5in between you and Michigan. you look at Minnesota, you look at Iowa, Wisconsin. There's been a lot of rain in a lot of areas. this year.

[Yeager] Do you make anything of that, or is it just kind of the way it goes?

[Pippitt] Yeah, I'm not on that. But I know that gentleman. You showed me a video out of his a week or two ago. I think you heard from Primghar, Iowa, but he was talking about ‘93, and I was only two years old. So I can't tell you, but my dad talks about that year, too, and I think he mentioned it was they didn't have any heat that year. And that's what dad said. That was one year. He remembers. They never irrigated the whole summer. They never irrigated. And then they got. But he said they lacked heat that year, but they get the harvest and everything was just average. He wasn't as bad as that guy mentioned, but it was disappointing. You know, they thought, you know, that during the pivots in this area that we were going to have great yields. And it just turned out where it wasn't a flop, but it was just very average. It sounded like. So, I am I, I mean, this is my, 12 year since I've been farming with my brother and, I believe 19 was wet, but not unmanageable. I mean, we had what we had to go around. We come back and build it later, and we don't have a lot of standing water like some states around us. We have low spots. We don't have really fields. We just can't get planted on a typical year. But, it's just hard to fathom what we had the last two years, how dry we've been to have this much rain. This I mean, it's just almost unheard of. So what to make of it? I guess I'm a little, I'm sure, but I guess I'm just happy that we're at least filling our profile back up. And if we do get hot and dry, I mean, we're just so much farther ahead of normal. It's just I know we and the unfortunate part was we had a lot of rain on the creek till we couldn't handle it all. I mean, we wasted some, but just to get we put a lot of cover crops this year in the past and we've always felt like last year we terminated them early because we thought they're using too much moisture. And this year we were happy with the field that had cover crops on because we had plenty of moisture at and time they grew. They were tall, they were nice to plant and do. We didn't have any erosion out of them. So this year that kind of shine too. So we've learned some things. And yeah, I guess I'm happy with the moisture. This year we had a little bit too much at times, but for the most part it was welcome.

[Yeager] And I'm guessing when you've been on those fields that have had the cover crops that you terminated, are you feeling like you're not sinking into the ground? You may be able to get over them when you're spraying and you talked about planting maybe in some muddy spots. Not your words. Mine. Yeah. but you probably felt a little better. And where you did plant on top of that cover crop.

[Pippitt] Yeah. And we plant ours green. We terminate immediately the day after the day after we, planet. So the spring or something is in the same field right behind the planter, but it seems like it planted very nice. And we did not. Everything was covered, so we didn't everything go that tall? I mean, it was probably waist high. We're putting according to it. But yeah, it was just consistent. And there was I mean, we had a lot of fields here that just have ditches and water ran down, cut them out. You fix them up in the rain again, cut them out. This we just left untouched. We didn't ask any field. We didn't fix any tracks. We just left it. And the rye grew. And yeah, that foil had minimal erosion. So it was nice. Planting to is all even came up nice. And it was later plants on the ground had warmed up too by then, but it just was very nice emerging and like right now the right you can't tell because the corn so tall but you walk out in it and the rye is just kind of like a mat on the ground. So like I say, you know, I keep referring if it goes, if it does get hot and dry, I think what also happens is to retain soil moisture too and make us more efficient irrigating. And I mean, we have yet to see that we got to prove it. But in my mind, theoretically, I think it'll help us if it does, to get hot and dry here the month of July and August. I mean, we have our heavy irrigating months coming up, and I suppose in a week or probably we use about as much moisture going to. So maybe we'll fire Monday and see how long it goes. But it'll be interesting this year to see because we are just a little, pleased last year of how early we had to terminate or cover crops just because we feel like there isn't too much moisture and we didn't want to take a chance. So we went out and did get a lot of growth out of them. So it was it was nice to see this year and to see some. The fields are green before anybody else's and it's just be nice to see how the rest of the summer plays out.

[Yeager] It's certainly 2024 is going to be a data point. Yeah, a big data point for you on the the extreme wet side.

[Pippitt] Yeah. ‘19 was wet but not like this I would say my 12 years. This is by far the most rain and the short amount of time that I've dealt with. And even as a kid before, I actually was farming on my own, I don't remember, I don't remember, planting like that, but I can remember.

[Yeager] I've looked at my lawn and went, it is not normally this green. It looks like May Green in July. I mean, how many 4th I've had where everything is brown. I mean, I mean, I'm guessing around you were like us last year. No fireworks displays on the fourth because of its drought. And we're afraid that something's going to, you know, start some fire.

[Pippitt] Yeah, just everything's good. The trees are good. The ditches look good. The grass looks like you made the cut out your lawn. I tend to enjoy my lawn more this year. I didn't put that many hours on it last year. And, yeah, the grass is green. It keeps growing. And it got a no more than once a week. And so yeah, it just everything looks better when it's green to me. Like you said, it just when it's dry and and like, you know around us where you're not quite so familiar but so when they make their circle the corners, you know what. Each side. They were dried up last year even by this time. They were noticeable last year because we do a late pass, fertilizer pass. We have a wide drop for our sprayer. So we usually do that typically around the 1st of July and last year. You can see exactly where to set the sprayer on and off, because the corners are so dried up already. And usually that time of year you can't tell a difference. Then usually that's an August or September thing when the corners start drying up. But last year we could tell the first week of July exactly where the pivots hadn't got because it was already that much drier. You could just tell.

[Yeager] So yeah, you're going to have to do extra combining this. You're gonna have to combine the corners.

[Pippitt] Yeah, I know, and they'll probably be worse. So yeah, last year they were probably rough speaking, the whole part like this. But I would say close to maybe like an 80 bushel lag, you know, in corners last year versus the year. Data just made some worse than that and some better farms. Not that much. But I say it's just considerable. When you have close to 25 acres and you're dry land corners, that's a big chunk on a 160 acre farm. So your pivot might produce very well. But when you have 25 acres, it brings your average down. So our yields on whole field yields always sound as good as what you think are when you're combining. But it's just the way it goes well.

[Yeager] And the way it goes is I got to get you back on that sprayer. I appreciate you taking time, Bryan.

[Pippitt] Yeah. No, it's a pleasure. Glad to talk to you and glad I guess some of it's good to report to you, but when I talk to you last time, I got a lot different field I did back then. So happy where we're at.

[Yeager] Well, it's good to see. Good to see someone smiling. And he's been smiling this whole time, so obviously, feeling pretty good. I like the optimism.

[Pippitt] Yeah. If we get the prices to go up, that's the next thing. But we won't get into that. So another discussion.

[Yeager]  We'll take care of that here in a few minutes on the show.

[Pippitt] Okay.

[Yeager] My thanks to those of you that watched and listened, the work that's done here at Market to Market and Iowa PBS are executive producer of this podcast is David Miller. Technical support comes in this form. Chad Aubrey, is the production supervisor, his technicians of Sean Ingrassia, Kevin Rivers, Neil Kyer, Julie Knutson and David Feingold help make this podcast happen each and every week. My boss again, Dave Miller, I'm Paul Yeager, your host and producer and editor of this podcast. We'll see you next time. Thanks for watching. Bye bye.

Contact: Paul.Yeager@IowaPBS.org