You saw on Monday that our last hay harvest of this year happened on the weekend. In Illinois, harvest is also underway, although there’s some variation in the crops. Sarah is here today to share a crop report.

Harvest 2017 is officially underway. I say “officially” but that just means that I saw my first combine this week.

If you remember back to some of my spring posts, we had an extremely wet season.

Of course it affected my planting but more importantly it affected the farmers’ planting. Most farmers either had to wait to plant, planted then had to re-plant, or some were just lucky enough that the first planting made it.

With these three scenarios, I find it fascinating that fields that are usually all ready to harvest about the same time are now looking completely different.

I took pictures on my way home one night of different fields of soybeans all in different stages of harvest.

Not at all ready to harvest:

Starting to show signs of the foliage dying:

And almost ready:

The corn is in similar stages:

None of these examples are from the fields that Steve farms. He says that he is about 2 weeks away from cutting his first beans. I think this is going to be a long drawn-out harvest season.

How are crops doing in your area? Have you seen any signs of harvest approaching?

It seems like this has been a good season for hay in our area. The wet weather has meant it just keeps on growing. The farm across the road had at least three cuts, I think. You have me curious about beans and corn, Sarah. I’m going to have to find a field and take a look.