When the dew point is 78F at 6 am, you know it’s going to be a miserable day in the upper Midwest. Unfortunately, it’s going to be a miserable week.

It’s too late this year to begin thinking about how to maintain sale weight in summer months. In about 6 weeks we’ll reach the seasonal low in sale weights and begin our fall climb in weights. The obvious question for me as a management consultant – what are you going to do different next year to reduce the slump in summer sale weights? The pigs you’re selling now were in finishers April 1. What did you do this year back then to set up the pigs for better summer gains?

Last week I had the chance to drive across much of northern Iowa and down past Jefferson, Iowa. I did not get into the area between Ames and Waterloo that experienced the very high wind damage. Overall, the corn and beans I saw during my travels looked tremendous, with most of it tasseling (or on the verge of shooting a tassel). By Thursday, I saw quite a few silks in the end rows.

Here in Minnesota the crop is much more variable. The storms on Friday dumped 2+ inches on many areas with reports of as much as 7 inches of rain in some areas. This will be the 4th or 5th ‘drowning’ for some fields. Minnesota is thought of as the Land of 10,000 Lakes. This year we have localized areas that have 10,000 lakes as the low spots continue to receive too much water. The good news – we don’t have to worry about a moisture stress during tasseling/silking.

Many of the producers I’ve been with this past week have been speculating on the impact of the heat and high humidity on the pollinating corn plant. This spring Iowa State University Extension released an revised “Corn Growth and Development” publication that gives the latest details on corn plant development. It is available at https://www.extension.iastate.edu/store/ItemDetail.aspx?ProductID=6065&SeriesCode=&CategoryID=&Keyword=corn%20growth .

On Wednesday of this week I will be at the Manure Expo in Norfolk, Nebraska. This is a hands-on event that moves from state to state, with Iowa as the host last year. This expo will be a good chance for people to see center pivot application of manure and a chance to ride in GPS equipped applicators,