North Dakota farmers will seed 500,000 fewer acres of spring wheat this year than expected, says Jim Peterson, marketing director for the North Dakota Wheat Commission.
Wheat acreage will likely drop even further if producers don’t receive dry weather in the last week of May, he added.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture predicted in its March planting intentions forecast that North Dakota farmers would seed 7.1 million acres of spring wheat, up 700,000 acres from last year. As well, the department predicted that North Dakota would have 1.6 million acres of durum in 2011, down from 1.8 million in 2010.
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“The impression right now, and obviously things could change, is that (wheat) acres will be down from the March forecast,” said Peterson.
“If you look at those two numbers now, you easily could be a half a million less on spring wheat acres, if not more. And on the durum acres, they certainly could slip another 100,000 acres, if not more.”
North Dakota wheat growers were well behind typical seeding schedules by the middle of May, based on numbers from the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service.
Spring wheat seeding in North Dakota was, on average, 68 percent complete by May 15 between 2006 and 2010.
However, only 15 percent was planted by May 15 this spring.
Durum progress was even further behind. Growers usually have 46 percent of their durum in the ground by May 15, but only three percent was seeded this year.
Joel Ransom, an extension agronomist with North Dakota State University, said the state’s north-central and northwestern regions are the areas of greatest concern because the late April storm that dumped snow on southeastern Saskatchewan and western Manitoba also soaked fields in northwestern North Dakota.
“There will some areas that will not be planted, I think,” he said. “The north-central, kind of around Minot and that area, there’s a good chance of a lot of preventive planting (unseeded acres) in that area.”
He said unseeded acreage could rise higher than expected because farmers may choose to take the payment from prevent-plant insurance rather than seed a crop at a late date into iffy soil conditions.
Peterson said North Dakota farmers are also facing washed out county roads, making it difficult to get equipment to fields.
The crop insurance deadlines for wheat are May 31 in the southern half of North Dakota and June 5 in the northern half. Peterson said wheat growers may opt for other crops if the weather doesn’t turn around in the last week of May.
“Sunflowers are at a pretty good price and they’re a crop that can be planted later.”
