Local harvest just about wrapped up

The wheat harvest in the Odessa area is about 90 percent complete, and as most people suspected when harvest began, the outcome has been rather dismal. Overall dryland yields were down by about 40 to 50 percent overall, according to Mark Cronrath at the Odessa Trading Company, even lower than the initial reports at the beginning of harvest. For the second year running, yields have been below average. On top of that, the dollar has been strong lately, which tends to depress wheat prices.

At the Odessa Union Warehouse, Pearson Burke said yields in the Odessa area ranged from the mid-teens to the mid-40s (bushels to the acre), while the Harrington area harvest was closer to average. The Union also had some canola brought to the warehouse, but most of the winter canola was wiped out by freezing temperatures and lack of snow cover, Burke said.

Even irrigated wheat was affected, with yields extending from the mid-50s to about 110 bushels to the acre. Many irrigators were having to conserve their water allotment, and of course they, too, were hit by the same cold weather events that damaged the dryland crops.

Both men agreed that winter kill, persistent dry conditions, late spring frosts and the early summer heat wave created a “perfect storm” that hurt local crops pretty badly. Not only were prices down, but the weather conditions also created stresses that affected the quality of the wheat that did manage to make it through to harvest time. Protein counts were up (a negative in terms of soft white wheat) and test weights were down, also affecting the prices farmers can get for their crops.

Regarding the future outlook, Cronrath said dry conditions in other parts of the northern hemisphere, including Alberta and Saskatchewan in Canada, the Volga region of Russia, Kazahkstan, Spain and France, may well put upward pressure on prices over the longer term, although good harvests in the southern hemisphere in December and January could have the opposite effect.

Burke said that quite a few area farmers may qualify for crop insurance payouts, but how large those payouts will be depends on how the U.S. Department of Agriculture evaluates and averages the going prices throughout the month of August. As far as the outlook for next year’s crop, there is still much concern about the lack of moisture for fall seeding, Burke said.

More hot weather and not much rain are in the forecast for the rest of the summer. Should the ocean-warming phenomenon known as El Niño show strong development as predicted, the Pacific Northwest is likely to remain dry for some time to come. Past El Niños have brought drought to the northwest, while California typically has had more rain – welcome news for them, not so welcome for us. Most farmers we talked to were already looking forward, saying, “We’ll see what happens next year.”