Wheat Tour 2022, Day 2

On Wednesday, 83 people on the Wheat Quality Council’s 2022 winter wheat tour made their way from Colby to Wichita, Kansas, stopping in wheat fields along six different routes.

Wednesday’s wheat tour scouts made 254 stops at wheat fields across western, central and southern Kansas, and into northern counties in Oklahoma. The wheat in Southwest Kansas looks very rough, and the drought conditions aren’t just isolated to southwest Kansas, but into south central Kansas as well. Wheat behind corn provided some of the lowest yields, while wheat on fallow had some of the highest yields.

The calculated yield from all cars was 37.0 bushels per acre. Scouts were able to mainly use the late season formula provided by USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service, which includes counting wheat heads, number of spikelets and kernels per spikelet. The calculated yields were based on this formula, but many tour participants remarked that those yields seemed high. The wheat is so short that some of the heads will not be able to be picked up by the combines at harvest. The yield formula doesn’t take disease, pests or weed pressure into consideration. Scouts saw some instances of wheat streak mosaic virus, into areas farther east than expected or typical, but western Kansas didn’t have many instances of WSMV because of the drought.

Chris Kirby from Oklahoma Wheat Commission reported that the state’s production was estimated at 60 million bushels this year, down from 115 million bushels last year, according to USDA/NASS. She said that harvest started on the southern border of Oklahoma on Wednesday. With temperatures of 107°F today and forecasted 109°F tomorrow, harvest will move quickly. USDA/NASS estimates the Oklahoma crop will yield 25 bushels per acre, compared with 39 last year. Harvested acres are estimated at 2.4 million acres.

Wheat Tour 22 continues Thursday with six routes between Wichita and Manhattan. Follow along with the tour at #wheattour22. A final production estimate will be announced Thursday afternoon.

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Written by Mary Marsh, Communications Assistant