USDA Reports 16% of Corn, 14% of Soybeans Harvested

Sep 27, 2018

The USDA says this year's national corn and soybean harvests stayed ahead of average last week, despite delays in some areas because of heavy rainfall.

As of Sunday, 16% of U.S. corn is harvested, 97% has dented, and 72% has reached maturity, all ahead of the respective five-year averages of 11%, 93%, and 53%. 69% of the crop is rated good to excellent, up 1% on the week.

14% of U.S. soybeans are harvested and 71% are at the leaf dropping stage, also faster than the usual paces of 8% and 57%, respectively, with 68% of the crop in good to excellent shape, also up 1% from a week ago.

28% of winter wheat is planted, compared to 26% normally this time of year, while the spring wheat harvest is officially wrapped up.

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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.