Grain left in the field

Has anybody else noticed the earlier harvested beans and corn regrowing in the field? I haul a lot of grain for the neighbors, theirs was put in late so harvested later. Heading to the elevator I've passed lots of fields where they are green as a lawn with sprouting beans and corn. Most were harvested with real late model combines, john deere IH and gleaner, doesn't anybody check the trash anymore?

Are you sure its not a cover crop? They are gaining in popularity again...

It isn't the back end, it is the heads. Our corn was 19 to 14% and the beans were 18 to 8%. The reel was really shattering bad in most varieties. I don't have hydraulic deck plates. With close settings, I still shelled a lot. Monsatan wanted the seed pickers to open the deck plates so the second ear would go through the rolls. They claim that those ears don't make good seed. A BTO had some volunteer seed corn that was 3' + before the frost.

If you can think of something that would harvest 100% of the crop, you would have a real money maker.

Everybody is in toooo big of a D.....m hurry too. Does the meaning of "ground" speed mean anything today? I just love it when you saw commercials this spring about how fast a lawn tractor could go "mowing" your lawn. I like a slow walking speed, don't you?

Lot of reel shattered beans by me too. Mine looks like a cover crop too.

Hail storms will make any combine look bad too.

Hey glennster, is it that critical during harvest that you just touch a crop and it will just explode ? Is it the newer hybrids, or speed of operation, weather, what? As a kid I can remember you hardly ever saw an ear of corn with kernals laying in the field. Some stuff I have been seeing the past multiple years is more and more waste in fields. Not just some farming but also truck farms too. I think I just posted about the fields behind me. If not I will post it. I am really busy tonight.

there is corn by me , combined early , now the volunteer is tassled and putting on ears

Growing up in the 50,60s. The beans were trashed out by a stationary machine. The Lima beans were brought to the trashing machine in wagons. When the trashing maching left there were a lot of spilled beans. For a little spending money I would pick up by hand what had spilled on the ground. I think Dad gave me 10 cents a pound. Didn't get rich. Back then If I had a couple bucks I was rich. I remember my grand ma picked up a 100 pounds one season. Stan

There is always some grain left after a combine runs. This year with the abundant moisture anything left sprouted and is growing. There has been some hybrids in corn and some verities in soybeans that have lead to header loses. We have one number of soybeans that podded right to the ground. The sickle running an inch off the ground was missing 3-4 bushels per acre including the pods cut in pieces with the sickle. That field looks like it was seeded down. The beans still yielded over 70 BPA but make the field look terrible. One corn hybrid doubled eared 60-70% of the plants. The second ear has grain but has a cob that is smaller than the stalks. So even with the deck plates set in, as tight as you can and still have the stalk feed through, you shell the small second ear through the snapping rolls. This hybrid had a final stand over over 32,000 plants per acre. It yielded over 200 BPA. The weather conditions made it shot a second ear and that makes the header losses terrible.

Talk to the fellows that are having antique harvest days. These new hybrids of corn are much harder to harvest than the ones raised 30-50 years ago. The greener stem soybeans are hard to harvest too. IF you would put many of the old combines and pickers in these hybrids yielding over 200 BPA, the old machines would struggle to even harvest them let alone do a good job. The green stemmed soybeans will PLUG the older machines just like weeds did years ago.

So there MAYBE some operators that are not doing a good job but the majority are not that way. In general they are harvesting more, faster, in tougher conditions than combines have ever done.

I well remember the old combines not leaving much out the back. They left a heck of a lot at the header. I also remember guys harvesting at 1-2 MPH too with small grain headers. 10-15 acres a day being a good day.

So take that Gleaner "E" or John Deere 45 combine and go to the field right next to one of the newer machines a see how it goes. I think you will be surprised that the newer machines are doing a better job than they are being given credit for.

It's not the combine, it's the conditions.

So how tall was the volunteer corn of the small time operators?

It's probably because of the moisture and unseasonably warm weather in much of the mid west. Where I live it happens every year and many people cut the regrowth and bale it around this time of year, volunteer corn will average about 2 - 3 foot high right now. Back when most everyone had livestock as well as crops the fields were fenced and cattle grazed the regrowth until at least Christmas.

I have been seeing lots of "cover crop corn" in this area. It can't be from moisture. I asked a guy friday how much was growing and he thought maybe a bu. per acre. I didnt walk the field only drive by but I'd say it was a lot more. A friend of mine did custom combining in the 50's with a AC 66. He told me the old men he cut for would be on their knees and they better not find any grain. lol. If it's shattering at the head it sounds like a different issue. Makes sense it's all across the field not just where it comes out the back.

Ah... cover crop beans or corn? Are you real?? See what happens after first frost!

Some corn fields are solid green with corn. I'm thinking there has to be a better way.

Zero grain loss is practically impossible. No combine, old or new can attain zero loss. One half bushel per acre head loss can make a field look green when it takes root and grows. One bushel per acre is close to the population planted last spring. It still amazes me how a combine can sort the seed as well as it does from all of the plant matter going through the machine.

If there is any consolation, migratory birds will benefit! Hey

Right on, JD SELLER! Ben

Same way in Ky. Most farmers say they have never saw it as bad and are wondering why. Could be conditions or type of corn hybrid, but it does look like it was sown.

Harvest 100% of corn? 99.8%- spring farrowed hogs, will also do some plowing for you, get some grubs and beetles also. Add some cows just after picking, they'll get lots of the stalks as well. Need some good fences though and lots of ditch to ditch fields planted- so maybe another 25% only by Canada Goose and Mallards passing through, maybe some Turkeys if local flocks. Amish still have the fences and cleanup field livestock locally, some of dairy farmers have some fences yet for the rotation. RN

We're combining corn here and I've got corn growing from the ears that have fallen off in the standing corn. I've got a few soybeans that are growing from the earlier combined beans but not bad enough that I would have changed any settings.