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Monitor Grain In On-Farm Storage

By Marilyn Thelen, Michigan State University Extension

After a successful harvest, the next step with on-farm grain storage is to keep the grain in good condition until it is shipped.

Grain that is clean, dry and has minimal foreign material will store well. Grain should be stored in an aerated, weatherproof structure. Taking the center core of fines from the bin will improve air movement through the bin and improve shelf life.

The maximum moisture of corn in aerated storage is 15 percent if it will be stored up to six months and 13 percent if it will be held in storage for longer than six month. Soybean moisture should be 13 percent for storage up to six months and 11 percent if stored longer than six months.

Michigan State University Extension recommends bringing the grain temperature to below 50 degrees Fahrenheit as soon as possible after moving it into storage. This can be accomplished by aerating the grain as the outside temperature drops during fall. Insect activity is minimized at this temperature. With cold Michigan winters, grain can be cooled to 25 F for winter storage. As the weather gets warm in spring, the grain can be warmed by running the fans. This will decrease the risk of spoilage on the sides of bins from condensation.

Grain should be monitored regularly while in storage. Charles Hurburgh, Iowa State University Agriculture and Biosystems Engineering professor, suggests grain be inspected and temperature monitored weekly until December, and every two weeks thereafter.

Once harvest is complete and the grain is stored in the bin, attention to details will ensure the grain comes out of storage in good condition.

 

Source: msu.edu


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Why Your Food Future Could be Trapped in a Seed Morgue

Video: Why Your Food Future Could be Trapped in a Seed Morgue

In a world of PowerPoint overload, Rex Bernardo stands out. No bullet points. No charts. No jargon. Just stories and photographs. At this year’s National Association for Plant Breeding conference on the Big Island of Hawaii, he stood before a room of peers — all experts in the science of seeds — and did something radical: he showed them images. He told them stories. And he asked them to remember not what they saw, but how they felt.

Bernardo, recipient of the 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award, has spent his career searching for the genetic treasures tucked inside what plant breeders call exotic germplasm — ancient, often wild genetic lines that hold secrets to resilience, taste, and traits we've forgotten to value.

But Bernardo didn’t always think this way.

“I worked in private industry for nearly a decade,” he recalls. “I remember one breeder saying, ‘We’re making new hybrids, but they’re basically the same genetics.’ That stuck with me. Where is the new diversity going to come from?”

For Bernardo, part of the answer lies in the world’s gene banks — vast vaults of seed samples collected from every corner of the globe. Yet, he says, many of these vaults have quietly become “seed morgues.” “Something goes in, but it never comes out,” he explains. “We need to start treating these collections like living investments, not museums of dead potential.”

That potential — and the barriers to unlocking it — are deeply personal for Bernardo. He’s wrestled with international policies that prevent access to valuable lines (like North Korean corn) and with the slow, painstaking science of transferring useful traits from wild relatives into elite lines that farmers can actually grow. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. But he’s convinced that success starts not in the lab, but in the way we communicate.

“The fact sheet model isn’t cutting it anymore,” he says. “We hand out a paper about a new variety and think that’s enough. But stories? Plants you can see and touch? That’s what stays with people.”

Bernardo practices what he preaches. At the University of Minnesota, he helped launch a student-led breeding program that’s working to adapt leafy African vegetables for the Twin Cities’ African diaspora. The goal? Culturally relevant crops that mature in Minnesota’s shorter growing season — and can be regrown year after year.

“That’s real impact,” he says. “Helping people grow food that’s meaningful to them, not just what's commercially viable.”

He’s also brewed plant breeding into something more relatable — literally. Coffee and beer have become unexpected tools in his mission to make science accessible. His undergraduate course on coffee, for instance, connects the dots between genetics, geography, and culture. “Everyone drinks coffee,” he says. “It’s a conversation starter. It’s a gateway into plant science.”