Little Changes to USDA's Early Crop Production Estimates
Wednesday, May 13th, 2020 -- 8:55 AM
(Wisconsin Ag Connection) -For the most part, the USDA is sticking to its earlier crop production estimates for the 2019 growing year in Wisconsin.The agency released the updated figures on Tuesday after survey respondents in the region reported that a lot of corn and soybean acreage had not yet been harvested during the previous survey. Corn for grain production for the past season is now estimated at 443 million bushels, down two percent from the previous estimate and 19 percent lower than the 2018 crop year. Yield is estimated at 166 bushels per acre, two bushels below the January report. Area harvested for grain is estimated at 2.67 million acres, down 10,000 acres from the last summary and 500,000 acres less than 2018. Farmers that grew corn for silage chopped 18.2 million tons, unchanged from the previous estimate, but up 36 percent for the year. The silage yield estimate of 17.5 tons per acre is unchanged, but was 2.5 tons lower than 2018's actual crop. Producers harvested 1.04 million acres of corn for silage in 2019.
Soybean production is estimated at 79.4 million bushels. That's down 470,000 bushels from the January estimate and 24 percent less than the prior year. Wisconsin growers averaged 47.0 bushels per acre in 2019, unchanged from the last projection, but 1.0 bushel below the 2018 yield. The harvested acreage of 1.69 million is down 10,000 acres from the previous estimate and 490,000 acres lower for the year. And winter wheat production in Wisconsin is forecast at 9.10 million bushels, down five percent from last year's 9.60 million bushels. Based on conditions as of May 1, the winter wheat yield is forecast at 70.0 bushels per acre, which is 6.0 above last year. Wisconsin winter wheat growers intend to harvest 130,000 acres for grain, down 13 percent from 2019.
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