Weather And Yields ?? Hows Yours Doing

Here in western PA we are getting much needed rain the past two weeks.

    My yields on 1st cutting hay baled From 1st of June to 10th  July.  so-so on older fields 75-100 bales / acre (40 lbs. bales) on some fields yielding 125- 115 bales, My average is 120-130 bales,  to a new record in one area  at 165 bales and one field at 183 bales/acre. Showing what a difference of amount of rain we have had just in a 1/4 mile.

 2nd  cutting is coming in with the rain. Pastures have started to grow again. Just thankful for what we have got.  Didn't have a chance to plant any thing else. But looking at and hearing what others are saying and from watching rains we here in western PA back into North Eastern Ohio Looks like we are going to do Okay in some areas.

 Now back to the west, of the rest of the US it looks bad to just down right hellish. 

We haven't had any rain to speak of since the last week of May. Had about 7 inches that week. Had 15/100ths in June. Nothing in July. Crops look pretty good for what they are going through. Some of the poorer ground is starting to burn up, the better ground the corn is still green. The beans are what I am most worried about. Not many pods, and nothing in them. We had 20 plus days of 95 + temps, many days we are 100-105.  Long range forecast, no rain in sight. I sold off 70 sows leaving me with only 5. Sold off 86 ewes last week, only have 60 left. Sounds like my Dad wants to chop for the cattle. Small bales of hay are bringing between $11-15. I heard some good round bales brought $250 ea. What a guy could afford to feed that to, I don't know. What makes this extra tough on a lot of people, is much of the same ground that is burning up was under 10 foot of water last year.

I've gotten rain every week for about four weeks now with the first two being kind of freaky storms.  I didn't plant corn this year but I heard they'll get a crop but not sure on yield.  Beans were too stressed to spray with heat and drought and now are in bloom stage and too wet so probably won't get second spraying this year.  Some fields look OK others pretty grassy.  I've read that weeds don't affect yield that much this late in the growing so we'll see. 

We have had decent rain the past couple weeks, but it was a little dry before that. About all I keep up with is hay (premium grass and legume's" . My buddies are saying the grass hay is weak this year, and the fields look spotted not flush. They also say there could have been better nutritional numbers with more rain for absorption but the alfalfa has done pretty good, just mainly grass hay has suffered except for the Sudan type grasses which thrive in heat, but those are poor quality horse hay and can cause brain tumors in horses.

Teddy you have had a few more storms than what we have i have see them go over your side of the hill lol  our corn in new ground is doing good and beans in old corn groung is doing good  but this was not the year for no-till and it was my first time trying it now i got a sour taste from it.

                          Shawn