Corn Planting Pace Picks Up

There is plenty of action across the fields of South Dakota this week as good weather and field conditions continue to allow farmers to progress mightily on their corn seeding.

“The light winter, timely rainfall and good overall soil conditions should grant our growers an adequate window for planting just about all of their corn acres this year,” said SDCUC president and Mitchell farmer Chad Blindauer. “Mother Nature has given us a break so far and we hope this progress can continue to benefit us throughout the growing season.”

So how far along are we? According to the USDA-NASS as of April 22, 8% of South Dakota’s corn acres have been planted, which is 5% ahead of the five-year average and 8% ahead of last year’s progress of zero.

Corn planting progress in South Dakota can even be seen on Twitter. These are a few tweets from yesterday:

Darren Hefty @darrenhefty

#planting12 begins on the Hefty farm! pic.twitter.com/kx5QbTXN

Keith Alverson @cornfarmerkeith

A beautiful day for #corn planting! #plant12 pic.twitter.com/jp7Yoo8J

Tregg Cronin @tmcronin31

#Corn planting in north central SD. #plant12 yfrog.com/nu487lij

As you can see, farmers are taking to the field from all corners of Eastern South Dakota. If you’re interested in following along from your computer, just search the hashtag #plant12 to view the tweets from farmers planting all around the country.