Crop Progress And Condition

Jul 25, 2013

USDA’s NASS South Dakota Field Office reported corn condition is rated at 75% good to excellent in South Dakota and 5% in the poor to very poor. The U.S. corn condition dropped 3 points in the good to excellent at 63% and rose 2 points in the poor to very poor condition to 11% compared to 45% for 2012. The soybean condition dropped one point for the week with 64% at good to excellent.
Corn

The U.S. corn crop is 43% at silking stage well behind the 5 year average of 56%. The five year average for the key states of Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, and South Dakota are 71, 54, 46, 64, and 23 percent respectively. As of July 21st Illinois was at 64% and Nebraska reported 50%. Iowa and Minnesota were at 18% and 19% while South Dakota moved ahead of its five year average and finished the week at 32% in the silking stage. Silking is the most critical period in corn development for any type of stress to occur. Moisture and heat stress during silking may cause the greatest potential yield reduction, resulting in barren ears or poor kernel set. This makes the weather key the next few weeks.

Soybeans

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Video: Spring 2026 weather outlook for Wisconsin; What an early-arriving El Niño could mean

Northeast Wisconsin is a small corner of the world, but our weather is still affected by what happens across the globe.

That includes in the equatorial Pacific, where changes between El Niño and La Niña play a role in the weather here -- and boy, have there been some abrupt changes as of late.

El Niño and La Niña are the two phases of what is collectively known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO for short. These are the swings back and forth from unusually warm to unusually cold sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean along the equator.

Since this past September, we have been in a weak La Niña, which means water temperatures near the Eastern Pacific equator have been cooler than usual. That's where we're at right now.

Even last fall, the long-term outlook suggested a return to neutral conditions by spring and potentially El Niño conditions by summer.

But there are some signs this may be happening faster than usual, which could accelerate the onset of El Niño.

Over the last few weeks, unusually strong bursts of westerly winds farther west in the Pacific -- where sea surface temperatures are warmer than average -- have been observed. There is a chance that this could accelerate the warming of those eastern Pacific waters and potentially push us into El Niño sooner than usual.

If we do enter El Nino by spring -- which we'll define as the period of March, April and May -- there are some long-term correlations with our weather here in Northeast Wisconsin.

Looking at a map of anomalously warm weather, most of the upper Great Lakes doesn't show a strong correlation, but in general, the northern tiers of the United States do tend to lean to that direction.

The stronger correlation is with precipitation. El Niño conditions in spring have historically come with a higher risk of very dry weather over that time frame, so this will definitely be a transition we'll have to watch closely as we move out of winter.