CHICAGO (Reuters) — Condition ratings of the U.S. winter wheat crop were likely steady compared to a week ago, analysts polled by Reuters said ahead of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s weekly crop progress report due Monday afternoon.
Scattered rains last week in the southern U.S. Plains provided some relief for the parched hard red winter wheat crop, before more broadly reaching storms moved through the region on Monday.
Ratings for the winter wheat crop were seen at 44 percent good to excellent as of Sunday, steady from a week ago and above the 35 percent good to excellent a year ago, according to the poll of 10 analysts.
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The estimates ranged from 41 percent to 46 percent good to excellent, with portions of the No. 1 wheat-growing state of Kansas still in need of precipitation.
“Some of the western (Plains) areas remained dry,” said Jefferies Bache analyst Shawn McCambridge, who predicted conditions will increase one percentage point to 45 percent good to excellent. “Wheat’s a grass; throw some water on it and it starts to green and improve from a visual point of view.”
The analysts predicted corn plantings, in the first national report of that data, at an average of 3.5 percent complete. That would be roughly steady with the last two years after spring showers limited early sowings even as they replenished soil moistures in much of the U.S. Corn Belt.
The range of corn plantings estimates was two percent to six percent, according to the Reuters poll.
Spring wheat seedings were seen about four percent complete, with a range of one percent to nine percent. That would be two percentage points below this week last year.
