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Kansas Wheat Farmers Pleased With 'Solid' Harvest

Posted on: Saturday, 9 July 2005, 00:00 CDT

Jul. 9--WICHITA -- As the 2005 Kansas wheat harvest winds down, farmers and elevators say they are mostly pleased.

"It was an average harvest," said Norbert Gerstenkorn, manager of the Farmers Co-op Grain Association in Conway Springs, Kan. "It wasn't super good but it was solid."

The same was true of prices, which in spite of harvest pressure held up well above federal loan rates in most of the state.

That will mean a substantial reduction in the amount of subsidy dollars paid to wheat farmers this year.

Too much rain leached nitrogen from the soil and hurt yields in some fields, Gerstenkorn said. Rain coming right as harvest began also caused some drop in test weights.

But the rain damage didn't begin to approach last year's problems for most of the state as the sunshine and wind returned long before sprout damage began.

At Isabel, headquarters of the Farmers Co-op Equity, office manager Jim Wood said he was very pleased at a harvest that was up almost 800,000 bushels from last year.

"We had a little rust damage and a little rain damage," he said. "But overall, it was better than expected."

That was true in much of western and northwestern Kansas as well. "It's kind of surprising how durable wheat is," said Brenda Friess, merchandising manager for the Right Co-op at Wright, where harvest this year was close to double that of last year.

"We had thought we'd get around 35 bushels to the acre in our area. The reality was more like 40 to 45."

At Garden Plain Co-op, which has eight locations in Sedgwick and Kingman counties, the harvest was about the same size as last year but with more bushels of number one wheat, said Brad Scheer.

He said the elevator took in a total of 4.3 million bushels at all locations.

Andale Farmers Co-op has five locations in Sedgwick and Harvey counties and grain merchandiser Steve Morris said harvest was slightly smaller than last year. Farmers in the flood- plagued area around Sedgwick are still in the fields.

"We have taken in about 1.8 million bushels so far," he said. "That's about 74 percent of what we had last year, but we still have some still to cut."

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Copyright (c) 2005, The Wichita Eagle, Kan.

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Source: The Wichita Eagle (Wichita, Kan.)

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