Corn Tassels, But Not All At Once

Trent Brandenburg is happy to see all the corn tassels but he would prefer that all of his plantings were tasseling at the same time. Due to the “water stunting” of plants which were in wet ground during the the protracted wet weather in May and June, the crop maturity progress is uneven. Trent foresees average to better-than-average yields. He’s expecting some yield loss from the “hurt areas” that were too wet for too long.

Although the corn leaves are “rolling up” every day due to increasing dryness, Trent still sees his corn and soybean crops “looking good if we get some rain later this week.” Trent is now spraying for control of water hemp and other weeds. Although some aerial spraying of corn fungicide has begun in the area, Trent tries to avoid that expense by planting varieties less susceptible to the common foliar diseases. Unfortunately, the remarkable progress in development of better corn genetics in recent years is still lagging in some foliar-disease-resistance traits.